How many people have ADHD?

The Hunter vs. Farmer Hypothesis for the origin of ADHD & the role these individuals may play in the future of work

Have you ever been told that you have Attention Deficit (Hyperactivity) Disorder? If so, you probably know that you are most certainly not alone:

The Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported that 11% of children in the USA (between the ages of 2–17) have been diagnosed with ADHD — ‘ADHD’ is the official, medical term for the condition (it has been referred to as ‘ADD’, amongst other pseudonyms, in the past — though this is now outdated).

In adults, these figures are reduced — though still significant; the worldwide prevalence of adult ADHD is estimated at 2.5 percent, although figures vary and in reality, the number may be substantially higher (the estimate is 4–5 percent in the US).

The Hunter vs. Farmer hypothesis— in essence — makes the case that people diagnosed with ADHD are modern-day genetic descendants of hunters.

The analogy proposed in Hartmann’s book is simple: people with ADHD make for better hunters, while people without it — make for better farmers, and these hunters, whose genes have remained over the millennia, are now living in what is predominantly a ‘farmers world’ (where their strategies have become maladaptive in, for instance, the classroom).

How could some of these traits be beneficial to a hunter? The following table — based on a similar such table in Hartmann’s book — gives some ideas:

As hunter-gatherer societies were nomadic by necessity, and the hunters probably even more so, this certainly supports the hypothesis. The fact that ADHD is more prevalent in males also seems significant — as it is probable that, in prehistoric hunter-gatherer societies, the men hunted whilst the women foraged. This would lead to these ‘hunter-type-traits’ to be selected for within males disproportionately to females — which, as seen above — is what the data suggests.

ADHD has been linked to three aspects of creative cognition, namely: divergent thinking, conceptual expansion, and overcoming existing knowledge constraints.

On the surface, thus, it would again seem that those with ADHD characteristics have drawn the proverbial short-end of the stick — but is that really the case?

Throughout the industrial age, careers and businesses were built on strict hierarchies, where managers groomed — farmed — their employees as they ascended the rather rigid corporate ladder.

I would argue that the adaptability referred to by Harari is not one and the same as the impairment referred to in academic literature — rather, it is the ability to dive passionately into new endeavors and seize opportunities immediately as they dart out from behind the bushes.

As artificial intelligence and automation nab jobs of the past, boundless opportunity awaits those who are able to combine their creative, social, technical, and critical thinking skills — for this is the niche with which the machine can’t compete, this is the niche that will capture the jobs of the future, and this is the niche with which those diagnosed with ADHD are very familiar.

To conclude, I think — above all — that everyone’s future is up to them and the individual responsibility they take for it, ADHD or not. It is anyone's for the taking. And to those diagnosed with ADHD — the point I really wanted to drive home, was this: whether the Hunter vs. Farmer hypothesis is factually correct or not, please do not ever think of the label as a disorder. Rather, find a way to use it: figure out what it is you like to do, learn to work with and add value to other people, learn to finish to 100%, and perhaps most important of all, learn how to learn — and learn fast.

**A Note**

My grandmother told me upon reading this, and I agree with her, that there is a tendency in today’s society to give labels to everyone who has a certain kind of personality. But large groups of people cannot so easily be lumped into one category, despite our love to order and ‘box’ things. In reality, ADHD is just a term given to people that seem to exhibit many characteristics that themselves are toward a certain end of a spectrum. I think this is an important point she made. In hindsight, I would have made this article less polar and rather focus on the traits themselves having been possible remnants of past hunting societies.

ADHD

Hunter vs. Farmer Hypothesis

Hunter-Gatherer Societies

Entrepreneurship

Creativity

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