New research has shown a link between fidgeting and decision-making ability, especially amongst people with ADHD. Could this explain why some of us can’t seem to sit still? Matthew Scott investigates
The hardest part was moving while keeping still.
Dr Justin Fernandez had tasked himself with measuring the effect of fidgeting on the brain while the patient was inside an MRI machine - a process requiring almost total stillness.
The answer was strapping down the person’s head and allowing them to fidget to their heart’s content with the rest of their body.
This little moment of Kiwi ingenuity paved the way to findings that could affect the way people view the behaviour of people with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), as well as their own fidgeting.
The research, conducted by scientists from The University of Auckland and Gisborne’s Mātai Institute, found a link between fidgeting and executive decision-making ability.
The front of the brain is the domain of our ability to make decisions and other complex cognitive behaviour. Researchers watched as this area lit up with activity when the test subject fidgeted in the MRI machine.
Fernandez called this the eureka moment.
“When we saw activation in the prefrontal cortex while the person was fidgeting - that was it.”
He hopes to change people’s perspective on the ‘movement-diverse’, now the link between fidgeting and focusing is definitive.
This means the one in 20 New Zealanders with ADHD may unconsciously fidget to compensate for less activity in this part of the brain.
“People with ADHD normally have an underactive prefrontal cortex, but it is much closer to neurotypical when they are fidgeting,” Fernandez said. “It shows how marvellous the brain is that it makes up for things like this.”
Dr Sarah Watson said understanding why people with ADHD act like they do would lead to accepting them.
As a clinical psychologist, she has found herself living in the world of ADHD - not only in treating patients, but also raising a son who lives with the condition.
These findings bore out what she has seen in her work.
“They may not have known why, but if you asked anybody with ADHD if fidgeting helps them, they would say yes - 100 percent.”
People with conditions like ADHD face a lot of stigma, she said - which may be exacerbated by behaviour like fidgeting, especially amongst children.
“The ADHD community would welcome the legitimising of fidgeting,” Watson said. “It would help if parents and teachers knew what it meant instead of just shouting at them to stop.”
She has noticed other benefits to fidgeting such as getting rid of nervous energy and helping working memory in people with ADHD.
“There’s something soothing about it,” she said. “And the fact that it helps the prefrontal cortex certainly adds to that.”
But fidgeting is not exclusively the domain of people with ADHD. Fernandez said the study could also explain foot-tapping in the office or on the bus.
“If you ask a lot of people, they won’t notice when they are fidgeting but it’s often when they are concentrating,” he said.
If people understand why they do it, they can accept it.
“Sitting next to a fidgeter on the bus or in the office might make people uncomfortable,” Fernandez said. “Maybe not so much if we know why.”
His intention is to establish MRI as a quicker way to assess potential ADHD and eventually create an ADHD ‘brain atlas’ - outlining the ways an ADHD brain might look for doctors.
“The beauty of MRI is you can see what’s going on in the whole brain,” he said.
While ADHD is still poorly understood by most people, Watson thinks we have made progress as a society.
“We are a lot more accepting of neurodiversity than ever before,” she said. “Hopefully, one day we can see the ADHD brain as simply different, rather than better or worse.”
Researchers at Mātai and the University of Auckland hope their eureka moment will help people to understand how different each of our brains can be.
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