Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

To: jennyp
Perhaps individuals with personality traits such as novelty-seeking, and an uncontrollable tendency to persist in certain actions or activities drove the expansion, the study concludes. Moyzis notes that Native Americans, whose ancestors pushed their wanderings the farthest, also have the highest incidence of ADHD.

It was theorized long before this study that ADD/ADHD is a legacy from our hunter-gatherer ancestors. I had not heard of the data that American Indians have the highest rate of ADD, but it certainly fits the model: Native Americans were among the penultimate hunter-gatherers.

The flip side of this is to imagine what it must be like, if you have a novelty-seeking disposition and are easily distracted, to have to get up every morning in the same place, and spend dawn to dusk tilling the soil, sowing seeds, pulling weeds, and harvesting crops. People with this gene were never suited for that kind of existence.

10 posted on 02/10/2002 7:33:17 PM PST by longshadow
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies ]


To: longshadow
Native Americans were among the penultimate hunter-gatherers.

Vocabulary alert: Penultimate doesn't mean the best, it means "next to the ultimate". But the word certainly sounds like it's the max.

15 posted on 02/12/2002 9:42:09 AM PST by PatrickHenry
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 10 | View Replies ]

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article


FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson