Factors affecting treatment acceptability for psychostimulant medication versus psychoeducational intervention

Future teachers' judgments of acceptability for two common treatments for c hildren with the Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) label were examined. One hundred forty-four pre-service teachers were grouped accordi ng to their high school location at graduation (urban vs. rural) and were r andomly assigned to read one of four vignettes. The content of the vignette s was held constant but label (ADHD vs no label) and treatments (special ed ucation placement vs. Ritalin) were varied. Results indicated a significant main effect on treatment acceptability for High School Location, a Label X Treatment interaction on the attention problems variable, a main effect fo r Label on the social problems variable, and a High School Location X Treat ment interaction on the social problems variable. A number of implications can be made. Observer characteristics such as urban or rural high school ex periences may influence judgments about a labeled child more than the chara cteristics of the child being observed. In this study, the ADHD label evoke d greater expectations of attentional difficulties even when the pattern of functioning was similar to nonlabeled children. On the other hand, childre n with the ADHD label were judged as having better social functioning, whic h suggests that the ADHD label allows observers to attribute behavioral dif ficulties or the social problems displayed by these children to some factor that is outside the control of the child, or for which the child does not have personal responsibility. (C) 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.