Adult ADHD · Capacity and circumstances

ADHD exploration and evolutionary theory

Evolutionary theories of exploration and ADHD traits, and what current research suggests about curiosity, contribution and context.

Nisha Bal · Founder & Principal OT
Updated 11 October 2026

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When I think about ADHD, I also think about the person looking out over the horizon. The person who wonders what lies beyond the next mountain, who wants to discover another resource or another way of doing things. There are evolutionary theories that ask whether some characteristics now associated with ADHD could have carried advantages in other circumstances. A community could have had use for curiosity, movement, readiness to explore and a willingness to leave the familiar.

That image gives us a different question to consider. What might a group gain from someone who notices another possibility, becomes restless with an unproductive routine or wants to investigate an unfamiliar place? Human communities have needed people who can establish reliable practices and people who can look beyond them. The balance between those tendencies can matter when resources, threats and opportunities change.

The evolutionary account is a theory about that long history. Its value for clinical thinking is that it asks us to consider the contribution and the setting together. A characteristic acquires a consequence through the circumstances in which it is expressed. Readiness to move on may help when a resource is being exhausted. The same readiness may carry a cost when staying with a productive option is the more useful action. We need to understand what the situation is asking of the person.

Current research begins to make that question concrete. In a virtual foraging experiment, adults collected berries from patches that became less productive over time. People who screened positive for ADHD symptoms left earlier and achieved higher reward rates. Their tendency to explore brought a benefit in that setting. In another experiment with diagnosed adults, greater exploration of several changing options was associated with earning fewer points. The tasks place different demands on deciding when to stay and when to search elsewhere.

These findings make the circumstances central to the interpretation. “Moves on quickly” is an incomplete description until we know what the person is moving from, what they are moving toward and how those choices affect the activity. Clinically, I want that level of detail. Is the person abandoning an important step, finding a more useful approach or responding to a task that has stopped giving them meaningful information? The same visible behaviour can contain different processes.

Curiosity offers another research connection. A recent adult study associated hyperactive–impulsive traits with greater self-reported curiosity. The proposed evolutionary question is whether a tendency toward information seeking could have helped in environments where discovering an option carried value. The practical question today is how to give that curiosity a useful direction. Learning, making, problem solving and exploring a place can offer somewhere for it to develop into knowledge and contribution.

Human existence is much longer than the systems we now treat as normal. Modern routines occupy a very recent part of that history, and the social and technological conditions around us have changed rapidly. We organise much of daily life through clocks, written instructions, administrative systems, screens and rewards that remain abstract and distant. Those arrangements ask particular things of attention and motivation. Some people find the fit easier; others spend a great deal of effort containing themselves within it.

Getting bored with repetition or mundane activity does not tell me that someone lacks intelligence. It tells me to investigate the experience. What is missing from the task? What does the person know how to do? Does movement help them become involved? Can they see a purpose or a problem worth solving? Where does their attention become alive? Those questions allow us to look for the conditions in which a capacity can become visible.

The history of criticism also matters. A person can spend years being judged against demands that repeatedly expose their difficulty, while receiving little opportunity to show another kind of ability. Discovering a better fit can change the meaning of that history. It may become possible to recognise curiosity, energy and inventive thinking alongside the executive support that is still required. This is one reason I want therapy to include exploration of strengths and circumstances, as well as symptom management.

We can use the horizon and the mountain as images for this enquiry. They invite us to ask what a person might contribute when their energy has somewhere to go. In an ordinary week, that may mean a practical role, a changing set of problems, learning a skill or a project with direct feedback. We can then build systems for planning, judgement, completion and the routines around it. The person's readiness to explore needs a way to become part of a workable life.

Celebrate what you have in a form you can use. The SEEDS model helps us examine the person and the surrounding conditions together: the body, relationships, activity and wider demands. We can look for settings where curiosity and movement serve a purpose, and we can change the conditions that repeatedly turn a difference into defeat. That is a clinical task we can begin in the present, while research continues to examine the longer evolutionary story.

The evidence behind the article

Research notes and references

The horizon, mountain and community-explorer imagery expresses the author’s evolutionary hypothesis. Present-day curiosity associations and exploration experiments offer relevant mechanisms and testable questions; they do not demonstrate prehistoric ADHD roles, selection or ancestral reproductive advantage. The adult virtual-foraging study used symptom screens and favoured earlier patch leaving, whereas the diagnosed-adult bandit study linked greater exploration to lower returns. These task-specific findings support examining trade-offs and conditions. Adult occupational accounts add real-life experience but do not establish ancestral adaptation. Older DRD4 migration and nutritional associations are indirect; later selection analyses provide conflicting evidence. The childhood coin-search null result remains in the research record and is distinct from adult studies. Boredom is an aversive experience, not synonymous with neutral feeling tone. Better occupational fit and strengths use are proposed clinical directions, not proven treatments derived from evolutionary theory.

References: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19.

Le Cunff, A.-L., Russell, C., & Dommett, E. J. (2026). Hyperactive–impulsive ADHD traits predict higher curiosity in adults: Evidence from a cross-sectional study. BMC Psychology, 14, 723. https://doi.org/10.1186/s40359-026-04504-7
Read source 1
Study notes
Cross-sectional UK survey of 521 adults, aged 18–86, including formally diagnosed and self-identified participants. Hyperactive–impulsive traits uniquely associated with self-reported curiosity after demographics and inattention (beta .26); inattention was not independently associated. Predominantly female, highly educated convenience sample. Measures curiosity association, rather than functional advantage or evolutionary fitness. Full article read.
Le Cunff, A.-L. (2024). Distractibility and impulsivity in ADHD as an evolutionary mismatch of high trait curiosity. Evolutionary Psychological Science, 10, 282–297. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40806-024-00400-8
Read source 2
Study notes
Original theoretical article proposing that high curiosity could aid information and resource exploration under ancestral uncertainty and create mismatch in some contemporary settings. Offers testable predictions and discusses presentation differences. Provides the scholarly hypothesis, rather than an ancestral-advantage experiment. Full article read.
Chen, C., Burton, M., Greenberger, E., & Dmitrieva, J. (1999). Population migration and the variation of dopamine D4 receptor (DRD4) allele frequencies around the globe. Evolution and Human Behavior, 20(5), 309–324. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1090-5138(99)00015-X
Read source 3
Study notes
Ecological population-genetic analysis of 2,320 people from 39 populations. Longer DRD4 alleles associated with reconstructed migration distance and nomadic settlement. Individual ADHD, exploration and ancient social roles were not measured; population structure affects interpretation. Original publisher abstract verified.
Matthews, L. J., & Butler, P. M. (2011). Novelty-seeking DRD4 polymorphisms are associated with human migration distance out-of-Africa after controlling for neutral population gene structure. American Journal of Physical Anthropology, 145(3), 382–389. https://doi.org/10.1002/ajpa.21507
Read source 4
Study notes
Population-genetic reanalysis accounting for neutral genetic structure. Associations between migration distance and DRD4 2R/7R remained beyond modelled neutral processes. No clinical ADHD or individual behavioural measurement. Relevant to a selection hypothesis. Original publisher abstract checked.
Eisenberg, D. T. A., Campbell, B., Gray, P. B., & Sorenson, M. D. (2008). Dopamine receptor genetic polymorphisms and body composition in undernourished pastoralists: An exploration of nutrition indices among nomadic and recently settled Ariaal men of northern Kenya. BMC Evolutionary Biology, 8, 173. https://doi.org/10.1186/1471-2148-8-173
Read source 5
Study notes
Observational study of 87 settled and 65 nomadic adult Ariaal men in Kenya. DRD4 7R associated with better nutritional indices among nomads and worse indices among settled men; allele frequency did not differ by setting. Participants were chronically undernourished, and ADHD and exploration were not measured. Behavioural and physiological mechanisms remained open. Full article read.
Ding, Y.-C., Chi, H.-C., Grady, D. L., Morishima, A., Kidd, J. R., Kidd, K. K., Flodman, P., Spence, M. A., Schuck, S., Swanson, J. M., Zhang, Y.-P., & Moyzis, R. K. (2002). Evidence of positive selection acting at the human dopamine receptor D4 gene locus. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 99(1), 309–314. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.012464099
Read source 6
Study notes
Resequencing and haplotype analysis of 600 DRD4 alleles worldwide. Authors interpreted sequence, linkage and frequency patterns as evidence of positive selection favouring 7R. This early selection account is considered alongside later conflicting tests; it did not measure ancestral ADHD. Original abstract and relevant study text checked.
Naka, I., Nishida, N., & Ohashi, J. (2011). No evidence for strong recent positive selection favoring the 7 repeat allele of VNTR in the DRD4 gene. PLOS ONE, 6(8), e24410. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0024410
Read source 7
Study notes
HapMap genetic analysis using haplotype and neutrality tests found no evidence of strong recent positive selection favouring DRD4 7R. Material conflicting evidence for the older genetic selection account, addressing this allele and these tests. Full article read.
Esteller-Cucala, P., Maceda, I., Børglum, A. D., Demontis, D., Faraone, S. V., Cormand, B., & Lao, O. (2020). Genomic analysis of the natural history of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder using Neanderthal and ancient Homo sapiens samples. Scientific Reports, 10, 8622. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-020-65322-4
Read source 8
Study notes
Analysis of contemporary ADHD-associated variants in ancient and archaic genomes found decreasing frequencies over roughly 45,000 years. The authors considered broad mismatch compatible but challenged farming as the decisive turning point. Ancient genotypes are interpreted through contemporary associations and do not diagnose ancient people. Full original paper read from the University of Barcelona repository.
Williams, J., & Taylor, E. (2006). The evolution of hyperactivity, impulsivity and cognitive diversity. Journal of the Royal Society Interface, 3(8), 399–413. https://doi.org/10.1098/rsif.2005.0102
Read source 9
Study notes
Evolutionary model and computer simulations exploring group benefits of behavioural diversity and exploration under changing conditions. Modelled agents are distinct from diagnosed people. The older DRD4 selection premise is considered alongside later genetic tests. Original abstract and relevant simulation methods checked.
Thagaard, M. S., Faraone, S. V., Sonuga-Barke, E. J., & Østergaard, S. D. (2016). Empirical tests of natural selection-based evolutionary accounts of ADHD: A systematic review. Acta Neuropsychiatrica, 28(5), 249–256. https://doi.org/10.1017/neu.2016.14
Read source 10
Study notes
Systematic review screened 790 records and included three early evolutionary-account studies. Authors judged these did not adequately test core ADHD features. This historical appraisal predates the later adult behavioural and curiosity studies. Original abstract and bibliographic metadata checked.
Arildskov, T. W., Virring, A., Thomsen, P. H., & Østergaard, S. D. (2022). Testing the evolutionary advantage theory of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder traits. European Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 31(2), 337–348. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00787-020-01692-4
Read source 11
Study notes
Physical-room coin-search study in 202 schoolchildren across ADHD-trait severity. Found no trait advantage or disadvantage after age, sex and estimated-IQ adjustment. One short childhood task, considered separately from adult experiments and ancestry. Original indexed abstract checked.
Addicott, M. A., Pearson, J. M., Schechter, J. C., Sapyta, J. J., Weiss, M. D., & Kollins, S. H. (2021). Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder and the explore/exploit trade-off. Neuropsychopharmacology, 46(3), 614–621. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41386-020-00881-8
Read source 12
Study notes
Six-armed-bandit experiment in 26 diagnosed adults with ADHD and 23 controls, with counterbalanced methylphenidate/placebo sessions. ADHD participants explored more lower-value options and earned fewer points; medication did not change these outcomes. Rewards gradually changed across trials. Different samples and designs limit direct comparison with the depleting-resource study. Full article read.
Griffin, B., Gosrani, R., & Eccles, J. (2026). Beyond comorbidity: Evolutionary insights into the concomitance of neurodivergence, major depressive disorder, and anxiety disorders. Evolutionary Applications, 19(3), e70221. https://doi.org/10.1111/eva.70221
Read source 13
Study notes
Original scholarly perspective on evolutionary trade-offs, cultural change, neurodivergence–environment fit and psychiatric distress. Current conceptual framework and proposed accommodation, rather than a new cohort or intervention test. Full article read.
Barack, D. L., Ludwig, V. U., Parodi, F., Ahmed, N., Brannon, E. M., Ramakrishnan, A., & Platt, M. L. (2024). Attention deficits linked with proclivity to explore while foraging. Proceedings of the Royal Society B, 291(2017), 20222584. https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2022.2584
Read source 14
Study notes
Preregistered online virtual berry-foraging experiment, 457 US adults, mean age 45.63. ADHD screen-positive participants left depleting patches earlier and earned higher reward rates. More exploratory behaviour was closer to optimal patch-leaving timing in this setting. Screen-positive status was unusually common: 206/457 (45%); these were symptom screens, not verified clinical diagnoses. Supports a context-dependent advantage for exploration. Adaptation, evolutionary selection and real-world occupational advantage remain interpretations rather than experimentally established conclusions.
Lasky, A. K., et al. (2016). ADHD in context: Young adults’ reports of the impact of occupational environment on the manifestation of ADHD. Social Science & Medicine, 161, 160–168. doi:10.1016/j.socscimed.2016.06.003.
Read source 15
Study notes
Primary qualitative interviews with 125 young adults originally diagnosed as children. Fifty-five percent described context-dependent ADHD experiences; interest, hands-on work and stimulation sometimes supported functioning. No randomised environment intervention. Full methods and results checked.
Hublin, J.-J., et al. (2017). New fossils from Jebel Irhoud, Morocco and the pan-African origin of Homo sapiens. Nature, 546, 289–292. doi:10.1038/nature22336.
Read source 16
Study notes
Primary fossil analysis identifying a mosaic of early Homo sapiens characteristics; dating from the associated work was 315 ± 34 thousand years. Supports the long timescale of human history. This does not measure ancient ADHD, cognitive traits or an inability to adapt to modern conditions. Primary manuscript abstract, context and methods checked.
Westgate, E. C., & Wilson, T. D. (2018). Boring thoughts and bored minds: The MAC model of boredom and cognitive engagement. Psychological Review, 125(5), 689–713. doi:10.1037/rev0000097.
Read source 17
Study notes
Original theoretical and empirical work on attention and meaning as components of boredom. Experiments support independent roles of attention and meaning; under- and overstimulation can produce boredom. General-population evidence, not proof of an ADHD-specific evolutionary role. Primary indexed abstract and author manuscript study summary checked.
Seiler, J. P.-H., Elpelt, J., Mashkov, V., Ghobadi, A., Kapoor, A., Turner, D., Kaschube, M., Tüscher, O., & Rumpel, S. (2025). A reduced perception of sensory information is linked with elevated boredom in people with and without attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder. Communications Psychology, 3, 47. doi:10.1038/s44271-025-00233-6.
Read source 18
Study notes
Primary experiment with 142 controls and 19 adult ADHD outpatients. Lower perceived information related to boredom. ADHD participants reported greater general boredom proneness and less perceived information from texts, while immediate boredom ratings were broadly comparable. Groups differed in age and sampling context. Develops the information–engagement question; it does not establish boredom as a universal ADHD strength. Primary article methods and results checked by the narrative research review.
Orban, S. A., Blessing, J. S., Sandone, M. K., Conness, B., & Santer, J. (2026). Why are individuals with ADHD more prone to boredom? Examining attention control and working memory as mediators of boredom in young adults with ADHD traits. Journal of Attention Disorders, 30(1), 8–22. Published online 29 July 2025. https://doi.org/10.1177/10870547251356723
Read source 19
Study notes
Cross-sectional comparison of 31 young adults with high ADHD traits and 57 without, mean age 19.1. Greater boredom proneness accompanied weaker attention-control and working-memory factors; statistical mediation accounted for small portions of the association. Symptom-defined university sample, extreme-group selection and simultaneous measurement limit causal interpretation and can inflate group effect size. Supports investigating cognitive demands as well as task interest. Primary publisher abstract verified; full paper was paywalled. Online publication was in 2025, final volume in 2026.

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