A Friendly Glossary of Common ADHD Terms Everyone Should Know

Living with, supporting, or simply trying to understand ADHD often comes with a whole new vocabulary. Some terms appear in research; others come from lived experience – but all help describe what ADHD feels like beyond diagnostic criteria.

Here’s a friendly, accessible glossary you can return to at any time.

A

Alexithymia

Meaning: Difficulty identifying, understanding, or describing one’s own emotions.
Why it matters: Emotional processing differences are common in ADHD, and alexithymia can make emotional regulation even harder.

B

Body Doubling

Having another person (in‑person or online) present to help maintain focus and reduce the friction of getting started.

D

Dopamine Deficiency / Dopamine Dysregulation

ADHD brains often struggle with consistent dopamine signalling, affecting motivation, reward processing, and task initiation.

Doom Piles / Doom Boxes

Unsorted piles or containers of items placed aside “to deal with later”, driven by out‑of‑sight‑out‑of‑mind thinking and executive dysfunction.

E

Executive Dysfunction

Difficulties planning, organising, prioritising, starting, and finishing tasks – even when you want to do them.

Emotional Dysregulation

Experiencing emotions more intensely and struggling to shift out of emotional states. Not in diagnostic manuals but widely recognised in ADHD.

H

Hyperfocus

Intense, sustained concentration on something interesting or stimulating. Not the opposite of ADHD – an expression of interest‑based attention.

Hypersensitivity / Sensory Sensitivity

Heightened sensitivity to sounds, textures, smells, brightness, or touch. Often overlaps with autistic sensory traits.

Hyposensitivity

The opposite to hypersensitivity! – usually and under arousal to the same things above (sensitivity to sounds, textures, smells, brightness, or touch). Also often overlaps with autistic sensory traits.

I

Interest‑Based Nervous System

ADHD attention is driven by interest, novelty, urgency, or challenge rather than importance or obligation.

O

Object Permanence (ADHD Context)

Forgetting things once they’re out of sight (e.g. items in drawers, emails not immediately visible).

P

Task Paralysis

Feeling mentally and physically unable to start a task, even when motivated – often due to overwhelm or unclear steps.

R

Rejection Sensitivity Dysphoria (RSD)

Intense emotional pain triggered by real or perceived rejection or criticism. Not an official diagnosis, but widely acknowledged within ADHD communities and many clinical settings.

S

Stimulation Seeking

Craving novelty or excitement – mentally or physically – through fidgeting, impulsivity, challenge-seeking, or new experiences.

Spicy Brain / ADHD Brain

Playful slang in the ADHD community for describing the nonlinear, energetic, and unpredictable nature of ADHD thinking.

T

Time Blindness

Difficulty perceiving time, estimating durations, transitioning between tasks, or sensing deadlines as “real”.

W

Working Memory Deficit

Trouble holding or using short‑term information – e.g., forgetting instructions, losing your train of thought, or walking into a room and forgetting why.

References

Alexithymia

• ADHD and Alexithymia: When Emotions Are Hard to Identify (Simply Psychology) [simplypsychology.org]
• Alexithymia and ADHD: The Most Common Overlappings (Neurodivergent Insights) [neurodiver…sights.com]
• The Connection Between Alexithymia and Severe ADHD (Psychology Today) [psychologytoday.com]
• Attention‑deficit/hyperactivity disorder and alexithymia: a pilot study (Springer, peer‑reviewed) [link.springer.com]

Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria (RSD)

• What is rejection sensitive dysphoria in ADHD? (UniSQ / The Conversation) [unisq.edu.au]
• Rejection-sensitive dysphoria: Why it hits harder for people with ADHD (Yahoo / Understood) [sports.yahoo.com]
• Do you just hate rejection or do you have “RSD”? (Fast Company) [fastcompany.com]
• Rejection Sensitivity Dysphoria in ADHD: A Case Series (Acta Scientific Neurology) [researchgate.net]
• The lived experience of rejection sensitivity in ADHD (PLOS ONE, peer‑reviewed) [journals.plos.org]
• Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria (RSD) in ADHD (Simply Psychology) [simplypsychology.org]

Executive Dysfunction

• Arousal dysregulation and executive dysfunction in ADHD (Frontiers in Psychiatry, peer‑reviewed) [frontiersin.org]

Emotional Dysregulation

• Emotional dysregulation is part of ADHD (American Psychological Association) [apa.org]
• Evidence of Emotion Dysregulation as a Core Sign of Adult ADHD (Simply Psychology, systematic review) [simplypsychology.org]
• Emotional Dysregulation in ADHD: The Brain Science Behind Big Reactions (Minnesota Neuropsychology) [mnneuropsy…hology.com]
• ADHD and Emotional Dysregulation (Therapy in a Nutshell) [therapyina…tshell.com]

Hyperfocus

• ADHD Hyperfocus: The Phenomenon of Intense Fixation (Simply Psychology) [simplypsychology.org]
• Understanding Hyperfocus and ADHD (Cleveland Clinic) [health.cle…clinic.org]
• Hyperfocus and the ADHD Brain (ADDitude) [additudemag.com]
• Hyperfocus: The Flip Side of ADHD? (Child Mind Institute) [childmind.org]
• ADHD and Hyperfocus: Understanding the Relationship (Verywell Health) [verywellhealth.com]
• Hyperfocus in ADHD: A Misunderstood Cognitive Phenomenon (Cambridge University Press) [cambridge.org]

Time Blindness

• ADHD & Time Blindness (Simply Psychology) [simplypsychology.org]
• Meta‑analysis finds consistent time perception impairments in ADHD (ADHD Evidence Project) [adhdevidence.org]
• Time Perception in Adult ADHD: A Review (MDPI, peer‑reviewed) [mdpi.com]
• ADHD Time Blindness: How to Detect It & Regain Control (ADDA) [add.org]
• How ADHD Leads to Time Blindness (Psychology Today) [psychologytoday.com]
• ADHD Time Blindness: Research, Signs, and Coping Tips (Medical News Today) [medicalnewstoday.com]