U.S. Attention Deficit Continues to Increase

Reading an article in the Times about the efficacy of Ritalin/ADD drugs on children reminded me of an opinion I've long held and not yet foisted on the world, namely: the reason so many people need a little neurochemical boost in order to pay attention is that so much of what we're asked to attend to is so profoundly boring. The article summarizes research which found that, over the long term, drugs like Ritalin do not improve children's academic performance.  Of course these drugs are not designed for long-term use or to increase attention span permanently, but rather to quickly, effectively, and temporarily mask fatigue and sharpen focus.  In fact, as the article notes (in passing), "similar types of drugs had been given to World War II radar operators to help them stay awake and focus on boring, repetitive tasks."

This point deserved a little more sustained attention, it seems to me.  Perhaps the author's pharmacy had run out of Ritalin this week, so here's the thing.  I remember elementary school, and it was generally boring and frequently repetitive.  Yes, I went to public school, but I hasten to add that I went to generally decent public schools in a small town, with an everyone-knows-the-librarian and everyone-knows-your-parents kind of atmosphere.  Still, the teachers had classes with students that ranged from the pale, ragged, tired children from the trailer park to the perky, dotted-upon, well-dressed children from enriched environments.  And we were all going to do multiplication tables over and over until poor barefoot Tommy (there really were a couple of kids who were sent to school barefoot--and this was in 1985) kind of, sort of, got it.  This is what we want public education to do, Leaving No Barefoot Trailer Park Child Behind and all, yet for those of us who understood quickly or already knew how to read/spell/multiply, it meant a lot of in-between, waiting time.  Time in which we were expected to Behave Ourselves and Be Quiet and Sit Still, too, which is basically a kind of Chinese water torture for smart seven-year-old boys.  Hence, Ritalin!  Which will help these little kiddos do boring, repetitive tasks for much longer, thereby keeping them occupied while the teacher drags Barefoot Tommy into the 21st (or at least the 20th) century.

The problem that ADD drugs solves is not the problem of any individual child.  Ritalin solves the problem of managing a classroom of children with widely varied backgrounds, abilities, and intelligence.  It is a solution for teachers and administrators, not children.  If we had an intelligently-designed public education system; if we funded it fairly, fully, and equably, so that we could dramatically reduce class sizes and retain talented teachers; if, in short, we were willing to strip away the past 30 years of piss-poor decisions that deliberately and with malice aforethought eviscerated public education in this country and go back to the raw solid idealism that was the foundation of American public schools, we wouldn't need to talk about the "long-term efficacy" of putting our children on amphetamines.

Postscript: Meanwhile, tuition at private schools in New York City is about to hit $40,000 per year.