The impact of comorbid anxiety on quantitative EEG heterogeneity in children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder

Changwon Jang; Soowhan Oh; Hyerin Lee; Junho Lee; Inmok Song; Yerin Park; Eunji Lee; Yoo-Sook Joung

doi:10.3389/fpsyt.2023.1190713

The impact of comorbid anxiety on quantitative EEG heterogeneity in children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder

Front Psychiatry. 2023 Jul 12:14:1190713. doi: 10.3389/fpsyt.2023.1190713. eCollection 2023.

Authors

Changwon Jang¹, Soowhan Oh², Hyerin Lee¹, Junho Lee¹, Inmok Song¹, Yerin Park¹, Eunji Lee¹, Yoo-Sook Joung¹

Affiliations

¹ Department of Psychiatry, Samsung Medical Center, Sungkyunkwan University, Seoul, Republic of Korea.
² Department of Psychiatry, Changwon Samsung Hospital, Changwon-si, Gyengsangnam-do, Republic of Korea.

Abstract

Objective: The objective of this study was to compare quantitative electroencephalography (Q-EEG) characteristics of children with Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), taking into account the presence of a comorbidity for anxiety disorder. It also sought to investigate the impact of comorbid anxiety on the Q-EEG heterogeneity of children with ADHD.

Method: A total of 141 children with ADHD but without comorbid anxiety (ADHD-Only), 25 children with a comorbidity for anxiety disorder (ADHD-ANX) and 43 children in the control group were assessed. To compare Q-EEG characteristics between groups, we performed ANCOVA (Analysis of Covariance) on relative power and theta/beta ratio (TBR) controlling for covariates such as age, sex, and FSIQ. Relative power values from 19 electrodes were averaged for three regions (frontal, central and posterior). Furthermore, cluster analysis (Ward's method) using the squared Euclidian distance was conducted on participants with ADHD to explore the impact of anxiety on the heterogeneity of Q-EEG characteristics in ADHD.

Results: There were no significant group differences in cognitive and behavioral measures. However, significant differences between groups were observed in the theta values in the central region, and the beta values in the frontal, central and posterior regions. In post hoc analyses, It was found that the ADHD-ANX group has significantly higher beta power values than the ADHD-Only group in all regions. For the theta/beta ratio, the ADHD-Only group had significantly higher values than the ADHD-ANX group in frontal, central and posterior regions. However, the control group did not show significant differences compared to both the ADHD-Only and ADHD-ANX group. Through clustering analysis, the participants in the ADHD-Only and ADHD-ANX groups were classified into four clusters. The ratios of children with comorbidities for anxiety disorder within each cluster were significantly different (χ² = 10.018, p = 0.019).

Conclusion: Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder children with comorbid anxiety disorder showed lower theta power in the central region, higher beta power in all regions and lower TBR in all regions compared to those without comorbid anxiety disorder. The ratios of children with comorbidities for anxiety disorder within each cluster were significantly different.

Keywords: ADHD; anxiety; cluster analysis; quantitative electroencephalography; theta/beta ratio.