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Comment by StevenWaterman | Hacker News Reader

This was a good article, but I want to briefly call out that `6X more likely to suffer from ADHD` is not a useful stat when trying to argue that being a founder causes health issues. ADHD is present from birth and cannot develop as the result of trauma.

It's still an interesting statistic, but for a different reason. People with ADHD are more likely to become founders, as they're more driven by passion, challenge, and novelty. Meanwhile, they're less driven by the security and consistency offered by traditional workplaces.

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I'm uncertain we can trust that '6X more likely' statistic. There is evidence/speculation that sleep deprivation can cause symptoms that mimic ADHD symptoms. For example: [0].

[0] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4340974/

Edit: That statistic is attributed to a Tech Crunch article [1], which in turn references another article [2]. The "6X" figure appears to be from one study involving 242 "entrepreneurs" and 93 "comparison participants" self-reporting on ADHD (and some other mental health-related conditions). It appears that the "comparison participants" were all students and faculty associated with the university.

I believe the relevant chart is on p. 14. Sleep and/or sleep deprivation doesn't appear to have been something that this study considered (or attempted to control for). (I didn't read this material extremely closely, however; maybe I missed something.)

[1] https://techcrunch.com/2018/12/30/investors-and-entrepreneur...

[2] (sorry, https seems unavailable) http://www.michaelafreemanmd.com/Research_files/Are%20Entrep...

> ADHD is present from birth and cannot develop as the result of trauma.

This is a misleading claim, as secondary ADHD can result from traumatic head injury, and childhood trauma can result in a condition that may differ from but is behaviourally very similar to ADHD.

And sleep deprivation/poor sleep habits, psychotropic use, stimulants, etc can all cause comparable conditions. I imagine the original quote isn't talking about a specific, concrete, diagnosis and is leaning more towards the colloquial use.

I had some meetings at the YC SF office 2 years ago and everyone I saw, and talked to, had a phone or laptop screen they were staring at while trying to also talk to you and in some instances pausing at their laptop to do something on their phone while occasionally looking up to notice you were still there and talking.

Anecdotally I find that doing the above can start to cause you to not be able to focus on any one thing with any real level of attention and I'm not a founder or startup employee that has a ton of real, and imagined, pressure/worry added to that.

I suspect it's also that employers don't like to hire people with ADHD. If traditional avenues get closed off then self employment might be the best alternative.

nah, we genuinely prefer working for ourselves if that's an option.

>ADHD is present from birth and cannot develop as the result of trauma.

How do you test a newborn for ADHD?

If you can’t, how can you say it is present from birth?

I’m not a healthcare professional but from what I’ve been reading clinical ADHD produces rather characteristic patterns in brain MRI scans in response to stimulation. I guess one could check that with a newborn if they found any value in diagnosing it so early?

All of those could just as easily be that people who have that condition are more likely to start a startup.

There's evidence coming out that ADHD is at least correlated childhood trauma, so it's possible trauma causes ADHD: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28477799

>ADHD is present from birth and cannot develop as the result of trauma.

Uh, source?

Another interpretation is that people with ADHD have less of the attention span which is required to work for someone else.

You cannot say that with certainty... I developed ADHD from trauma

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