Self-organization of mother-child instructional dyads and later attention disorder

Instructor-learner interactions are viewed from the perspective of dynamica lly self-organizing, coordinated systems. Mothers were asked to instruct th eir preterm and full-term 24-month-old children to sort blocks according to size and color (a challenging task for children of this age). Dyads were o bserved for their ability to find a mutual and stable instructional relatio nship. Dyads in which the child was later identified as having attention-de ficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) were marked by significantly less stabl e organization, less mutuality, and greater perturbations in the system. Mo thers of children later found to have ADHD tended to apply stronger constra ints than those whose children grew up to have no identified school problem s. Implications are drawn for optimal instruction of children who are at ri sk for central nervous system disorders.