Pincus J David, Beller Ken
Leading Indicator Systems, Boston, MA, United States.
Near Bridge, Inc., Sedona, AZ, United States.
Front Psychol. 2025 Jun 30;16:1606232. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2025.1606232. eCollection 2025.
Understanding emotional wellbeing in neurodivergent populations remains a critical yet underexplored area in psychological research.
This study employs AgileBrain, a novel assessment rooted in a neuroscience-informed model of human motivation, to evaluate emotional activation, valence, and unmet emotional needs across a large and diverse sample of adults reporting diagnosed neurodivergent conditions. The sample includes individuals self-identifying with ADHD, ASD, DCD, SID, SH, OCD, and other conditions, alongside a neurotypical comparison group.
Findings reveal systematic variations in emotional wellbeing indexed by three key indicators: (1) overall valence (positive vs. negative emotional needs), (2) activation level (intensity of emotional needs), and (3) the resulting wellbeing index (a composite of the first two). Neurotypical respondents exhibited the highest wellbeing, characterized by low activation and positive valence. DCD and ASD groups showed moderate wellbeing with elevated activation, while groups identifying with SID, SH, and OCD exhibited increasingly negative need valence and a steep drop in overall wellbeing. Notably, the largest group-those reporting ADHD-showed moderate activation with a negative need profile, resulting in low overall wellbeing. A final group categorized as "other conditions" (e.g., depression, anxiety, bipolar disorder, PTSD) exhibited the most extreme negativity in need valence and the lowest wellbeing scores.
The study demonstrates the value of a needs-based framework for understanding emotional profiles in neurodivergent populations. By going beyond diagnostic labels to quantify emotional need dynamics, this approach offers scalable, quantitative insights into the lived experience of neurodivergent individuals and highlights distinct pathways to improving wellbeing. The results support the potential for targeted interventions grounded in emotional need fulfillment to enhance resilience and support across diverse neurodivergent profiles.
了解神经发育障碍人群的情绪健康状况在心理学研究中仍是一个关键但未得到充分探索的领域。
本研究采用了AgileBrain，这是一种基于神经科学的人类动机模型的新型评估方法，用于评估大量不同的被诊断患有神经发育障碍的成年人样本中的情绪激活、效价和未满足的情感需求。该样本包括自我认定患有注意力缺陷多动障碍（ADHD）、自闭症谱系障碍（ASD）、发育协调障碍（DCD）、感觉统合失调（SID）、自伤行为（SH）、强迫症（OCD）和其他病症的个体，以及一个神经典型对照组。
研究结果揭示了情绪健康状况的系统差异，这些差异由三个关键指标衡量：（1）总体效价（积极与消极情感需求），（2）激活水平（情感需求强度），以及（3）由此产生的健康指数（前两者的综合）。神经典型受访者表现出最高的健康水平，其特征是低激活和积极效价。DCD和ASD组表现出中等健康水平且激活水平升高，而自我认定患有SID、SH和OCD的组表现出越来越消极的需求效价和总体健康水平的急剧下降。值得注意的是，最大的群体——那些报告患有ADHD的人——表现出中等激活水平和消极需求特征，导致总体健康水平较低。最后一组被归类为“其他病症”（如抑郁症、焦虑症、双相情感障碍、创伤后应激障碍）的个体在需求效价方面表现出最极端的消极性，健康得分最低。
该研究证明了基于需求的框架对于理解神经发育障碍人群情绪特征的价值。通过超越诊断标签来量化情感需求动态，这种方法为神经发育障碍个体的生活经历提供了可扩展的定量见解，并突出了改善健康状况的不同途径。研究结果支持了基于情感需求满足的针对性干预措施的潜力，以增强不同神经发育障碍特征人群的恢复力并提供支持。
