The role of the theory of mind and metacognition in predicting emotion dysregulation in male students with attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder

Many studies have pointed to the impairments of emotion regulation in attention deficit/ hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), but the main problem is whether emotion dysregulation in this disorder can be affected by the theory of mind and metacognition?

The present study aimed to predict emotion dysregulation based on the theory of mind and metacognition in male students with ADHD.

The current study was a descriptive-correlational design. The statistical population of the study was all male students of the sixth grade of elementary school (2567 people) in the cities of Bostanabad and Sarab in the academic year 2017-2018. The study sample included 90 students with ADHD selected through multistage cluster random sampling. The data were collected using Conners’ teacher rating scale (1998), Gross and John (2003) emotion regulation questionnaire, Sperling et al. (2002) children's metacognition scale, and Qomrani et al. (2006) theory of mind test.

The results of multiple regression showed that metacognition and the theory of mind together significantly predicted 34% of the variance in cognitive reappraisal and 42% of the variance in emotional suppression (p<0/05).

According to the results of the study, metacognition and the theory of mind have important roles in the emotion dysregulation of children with ADHD.