Social constructionist critiques of ‘biomedical control’ or the rise in prescription of ADHD medication have lately been some of the more prominent arguments that have been taken up in the UK media and other neo-liberal societies such as the US. Representation of ADHD has been historically variable, however, and ADHD has frequently been framed in the media as a polarised debate, pitting biological explana- tions against social and psychological ones. There are a greater number of complex representations of ADHD in more recent years (Ponnou and Gonon 2017) although the emphasis differs across cultures.
Psychosocial explanations in the media can translate as parental blame in the public imagination, for example, by association with a psychoanalytic rationale in the French newsprint media (Ponnou and Gonon 2017) or by referring to ‘the social, cultural and educational pre-conditions that drive the medicalization of specifically boys’ behav- iour’ in the UK newsprint media (Horton-Salway 2011: 543). In their analysis of Australian newsprint media (1999–2009), Harwood et al.
(2017: 7) have also described the way that stories of parental blame are constructed using a metaphor of ‘fault’ arguing that ‘parents were depicted in metaphoric terms of “hands-off parenting” or of not being
“on guard”.’ They also observed,
The themes of this book are the social construction of ADHD, social identities, gendering and resistance. In this chapter, we explore the following questions in relation to media discourse:
• How do the media represent ADHD?
• What social, gendered or stigmatising identities are captured by these representations?
• What forms of resistance to negative stereotypes might there be in the media?
Fig. 3.1 Representing ADHD in the media: book themes
a widespread positioning of a rise in rates of “bad” behaviour among children (predominantly boys) as a result of parents (predominantly mothers) focusing their attention on work rather than their children.
References to working mothers, busy parents, single-parent families,
“hands off parenting” and “poor parenting skills” were littered throughout the newsprint media. (Harwood et al. 2017: 7)
In stories depicting parental blame, the phenomenon of ‘mother blame’
is a common theme that might derive partly from the legacy of psycho- analytic theories (see Chapter 2). Evidence from Ponnou and Gonan (2017: 1) suggests that ‘…in France, the biological model of ADHD as a neurological disease has been counteracted by a psychodynamic under- standing considering that ADHD symptoms should be seen as a child’s response to emotional distress…’. One conclusion they drew from their study of media stories was that ‘according to French newspapers, the psychosocial model of ADHD appears to put emphasis on the persons (that is, children and parents) rather than on the society and this might reflect the influence of psychoanalysis in France.’ (2017: 8). Feminist writers have also emphasised that the discourse of parenting, family health and child care has an historical focus on mothers as the primary carer, provider of nurturing and parent responsible for healthcare (Blum 2007; Malacrida 2002; see also Chapter 4). Many media stories have taken up the gendered imperatives that arise from these theoretical ideas and the cultural stereotypes that are embedded within them.
Lay discourse about ADHD is likely to be influenced by media rep- resentations of ADHD and the stereotypes that they contain. The rep- resentation of otherness (us and them) is a popular strategy used by the media to frame concerns about social groups. For example, Olstead described how the media position people with mental illness in hier- archies of difference: ‘They are represented as having ‘degrees’ of dif- ference that radiate from what is constituted as the core, ‘normal’…’
(2002: 628). The construction of ADHD in the media and its focus on extreme behavioural problems, the social categories of ‘naughty boys’,
‘working mothers’ or ‘single parents’, identified by Harwood’s analysis of media stories, are examples of this. In Harwood’s example, the cat- egory of ‘working mother’ is evaluated against a normalised ‘ideal’ of
mothers as primary caregivers and, while the term ‘single parents’ is apparently gender neutral it implies stereotypes that not only define the parents of children with ADHD as other and marginal to the norm of two parent families, but also calls up the more culturally recognisable gendered category of ‘single mother’ with all of its historical connota- tions of moral censure. There is a long history of discourse around the category of ‘single mother’ that implies social problems, irresponsibility, absent fathers and state dependency. For example, Jean Carabine traced how ‘lone mothers’ have been produced and re-produced in historical discourse as ‘undeserving welfare subjects’ (Carabine 2001: 286). Even though these historicised discourses are not usually explicitly drawn on by media stories, they are nonetheless hearable in the selection of categories such as ‘single parents’. The formula for such stories is the definition of a problem linked to a social group who are marginal and blameworthy. This can be subtle and defined by the selection of descrip- tive terms, but such stories are common in the media and take many forms, being copied and replicated across many contexts (Valentine 2001). Many representations of ADHD, for example, take the form of cultural narratives that provide a social commentary, function to teach moral lessons, provoke public outrage or generate moral panics. They draw on or imply cultural stereotypes and appear in media news sto- ries as ‘a form of modern mythology’ that captures the public imagina- tion (Sternadori 2014: 303). Harwood et al. emphasise that the media representation of ADHD is more than a matter of social concern: It is inherently ideological, for example drawing on metaphor and forms of language that depict ‘science as fix’ but also represents parents as blame- worthy (Harwood et al. 2017: 2). Media framing and the forms of lan- guage used in stories and science reports are therefore an important aspect of how the public are likely to read and interpret the meaning of ADHD.
One function of the media is to report new knowledge and science information to the public and scientific explanation is a powerful form of discourse implying objective facts. However media debate also feeds upon the reporting of science research findings as a polemic (Colley 2010). While the appearance of balance, neutrality and fact is an important aspect of presenting credible stories and debates, many have
argued that complex science can be reduced by the media, to ‘a parody of science’ (Goldacre 2009: 225). Writing about Australian news media coverage of medication, Robertson et al. (2013: 2) argued that although popular media do indeed provide information on new knowledge and medicines they are also inclined to make ‘exaggerated claims of benefits’
and ‘inadequate coverage of harms’. This has social and medical conse- quences, since stories about new medicines, they observe, have indeed correlated with ‘increased patient requests’ (2013: 2).
Despite the circulation of information about ADHD, Furnham and Sarwar (2011) have expressed concern that the public are not at all well informed about causes and consequences. Perhaps families are bet- ter informed if they have a personal interest in researching the topic for themselves, as Alison Davies noted in her research on parents’ experience (Davies 2014; and Chapters 4 and 5 of this volume). Certainly some sec- tors of society are deemed to be better informed than others, for example women with a higher level of education are likely to know more about ADHD (McLeod et al. 2007). This is not surprising, since women are usually positioned as the custodians of family health (see Horton-Salway 2012) and those with a better education, resources and more social and cultural capital are likely to have greater skills and access to knowledge networks (Bourdieu 1979). Nevertheless, McLeod et al. have expressed a concern that the general public should be better informed and that
‘Future media and educational efforts should seek to provide accurate information about ADHD’ (2007: 626). However reasonable this might sound, the question still remains, what constitutes accurate information?
This is the challenge faced by the media in presenting ADHD as a con- troversial category and for the public who try to make sense of it.