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Preliminary Results of a Scoping Review on Assistive Technologies for Adults with ADHD

Valerie Tan, Luisa Jost, Jens Gerken, Max Pascher

TL;DR

This paper reports a PRISMA-ScR scoping review of technology-based assistive interventions for adults with ADHD. The authors identified 3,538 candidate papers, screened them with two independent raters, and included 46 in the final corpus (2007–2025), highlighting a strong recent growth in the field. Findings show a predominance of psychotherapy/education and cognitive training approaches, with mobile apps and VR/robot wearables among the most common technologies; usability evaluation is uneven across categories, and user-centered design is underrepresented. The study underscores the need for participatory design and context-specific ADHD technologies to move beyond deficit-focused paradigms and better empower adults with ADHD.

Abstract

Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), characterized by inattention, hyperactivity, and impulsivity, is prevalent in the adult population. Long perceived and treated as a childhood condition, ADHD and its characteristics nonetheless impact a significant portion of adults today. In contrast to children with ADHD, adults with ADHD face unique challenges in the workplace and in higher education. In this work-in-progress paper, we present a scoping review as a foundation to understand and explore existing technology-based approaches to support adults with ADHD. In total, our search returned 3,538 papers upon which we selected, based on PRISMA-ScR, a total of 46 papers for in-depth analysis. Our initial findings highlight that most papers take on a therapeutic or intervention perspective instead of a more positive support perspective. Our analysis also found a tremendous increase in recent papers on the topic, which highlights that more and more researchers are becoming aware of the need to address ADHD with adults. For the future, we aim to further analyze the corpus and identify research gaps and potentials for further development of ADHD assistive technologies.

Preliminary Results of a Scoping Review on Assistive Technologies for Adults with ADHD

TL;DR

This paper reports a PRISMA-ScR scoping review of technology-based assistive interventions for adults with ADHD. The authors identified 3,538 candidate papers, screened them with two independent raters, and included 46 in the final corpus (2007–2025), highlighting a strong recent growth in the field. Findings show a predominance of psychotherapy/education and cognitive training approaches, with mobile apps and VR/robot wearables among the most common technologies; usability evaluation is uneven across categories, and user-centered design is underrepresented. The study underscores the need for participatory design and context-specific ADHD technologies to move beyond deficit-focused paradigms and better empower adults with ADHD.

Abstract

Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), characterized by inattention, hyperactivity, and impulsivity, is prevalent in the adult population. Long perceived and treated as a childhood condition, ADHD and its characteristics nonetheless impact a significant portion of adults today. In contrast to children with ADHD, adults with ADHD face unique challenges in the workplace and in higher education. In this work-in-progress paper, we present a scoping review as a foundation to understand and explore existing technology-based approaches to support adults with ADHD. In total, our search returned 3,538 papers upon which we selected, based on PRISMA-ScR, a total of 46 papers for in-depth analysis. Our initial findings highlight that most papers take on a therapeutic or intervention perspective instead of a more positive support perspective. Our analysis also found a tremendous increase in recent papers on the topic, which highlights that more and more researchers are becoming aware of the need to address ADHD with adults. For the future, we aim to further analyze the corpus and identify research gaps and potentials for further development of ADHD assistive technologies.
Paper Structure (5 sections, 1 equation, 1 figure, 1 table)

This paper contains 5 sections, 1 equation, 1 figure, 1 table.

Table of Contents

  1. Introduction and Motivation
  2. Method
  3. Screening
  4. Initial Results
  5. Conclusion and Future Work

Figures (1)

  • Figure 1: Flow chart of the corpus selection process, which resulted in 46 papers.