How Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder Shapes Parenting: An Approach Grounded in Personas and Socially Aware Design
Abstract
Introduction: Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is characterized by persistent symptoms of inattention, hyperactivity, and impulsivity, impacting diagnosed individuals and their family dynamics. Objective: This study aims to identify the experiences, needs, and challenges faced by caregivers of children and adolescents with ADHD, based on the principles of Human-Computer Interaction (HCI), with a focus on Socially Aware Design and the construction of Personas to support the development of more empathetic technologies. Methodology: The research was conducted through the analysis of a dataset, in-person interactions, and the administration of online questionnaires, both carried out with parents and caregivers of children and adolescents with ADHD. Results: Based on the collected data, two personas, a mother and a father, were developed and validated, representing predominant profiles among these caregivers.
Keywords:
ADHD, HCI, Socially Aware Design, Personas
References
Alhefdhi, H., Alshehri, N., Zomia, A. A., Lahiq, L., Hussain, A., Alaskari, A., Alasiri, W., Alqarni, A., Asiri, F., Alqahtani, A., Asiri, M., e Alhifthy, E. (2024). Exploring quality of life, discrimination, and knowledge of parents of adhd children in saudi arabia: a cross-sectional study. Medicine, 103(24):e38102.
American Psychiatric Association (2014). Manual Diagnóstico e Estatístico de Transtornos Mentais: DSM-5. Artmed, Porto Alegre. Tradução: Maria Inês Corrêa Nascimento, Paulo Henrique Machado, Regina Machado Garcez, Régis Pizzato e Sandra Maria Mallmann da Rosa.
Ayano, G., Demelash, S., Gizachew, Y., Tsegay, L., e Alat, R. (2023). The global prevalence of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder in children and adolescents: An umbrella review of meta-analyses. Journal of affective disorders.
Babinski, D. E. (2024). Sex differences in adhd: review and priorities for future research. Current psychiatry reports, 26(4):151–156.
Baranauskas, M. C. C. (2014). Social awareness in HCI. Interactions, 21(4):66–69.
Baranauskas, M. C. C., Pereira, R., e Bonacin, R. (2024). Socially aware systems design: a perspective towards technology-society coupling. AIS Transactions on Human-Computer Interaction, 16(1):80–109.
Barkley, R. A. (2013). Taking charge of ADHD: The complete, authoritative guide for parents. The Guilford Press, New York.
Beck, A. T. e Alford, B. A. (2011). Depressão: causas e tratamento. Artmed Editora, Porto Alegre, 2 edition. Tradução: Daniel Bueno.
Brey, P. e Søraker, J. H. (2009). Philosophy of computing and information technology. In Philosophy of Technology and Engineering Sciences, pages 1341–1407. Elsevier.
Brown, L. E., Tallon, M., Kendall, G., Boyes, M., e Myers, B. (2025). Parents’ experiences of raising 7-to 11-year-old children with adhd and perception of a proposed parenting program: A qualitative study. Journal of Attention Disorders, page 10870547241309526.
Bunford, N., Evans, S. W., e Wymbs, F. (2015). Adhd and emotion dysregulation among children and adolescents. Clinical Child and Family Psychology Review, 18:185–217.
Calde, S., Goodwin, K., e Reimann, R. (2002). Shs orcas: The first integrated information system for long-term healthcare facility management. In Case Studies of the CHI2002-AIGA Experience Design FORUM, CHI-02, pages 2–16, New York, NY, USA. Association for Computing Machinery.
Carvalho, L. R. e Pinto, P. M. (2023). A associação entre o uso de telas e o desenvolvimento infantil: uma revisão de literatura. Research, Society and Development, 12(4):e2812440885–e2812440885.
Cibrian, F. L., Lakes, K. D., Schuck, S. E. B., e Hayes, G. R. (2022). The potential for emerging technologies to support self-regulation in children with adhd: A literature review. International Journal of Child-Computer Interaction, 31:100421.
Cooke, R. e Jones, A. (2017). Recruiting adult participants to physical activity intervention studies using sport: a systematic review. BMJ Open Sport & Exercise Medicine, 3(1).
Cooper, A. (2004). The inmates are running the asylum: Why high-tech products drive us crazy and how to restore the sanity, volume 2. Sams Publishing, Indianapolis.
Courage, C. e Baxter, K. (2005). Understanding Your Users: A Practical Guide to User Requirements Methods, Tools, and Techniques. Morgan Kaufmann Publishers Inc., San Francisco, CA, USA, 1st edition.
de Melo, T. M., de Carvalho, A. S., e de Andrade, L. G. (2022). O uso do metilfenidato em pacientes com tdah. Revista Ibero-Americana de Humanidades, Ciências e Educação, 8(4):891–900.
Delacre, M., Lakens, D., e Leys, C. (2017). Why psychologists should by default use Welch’s t-test instead of Student’s t-test. International Review of Social Psychology, 30(1):92–101.
Doan, M., Cibrian, F. L., Jang, A., Khare, N., Chang, S., Li, A., Schuck, S., Lakes, K. D., e Hayes, G. R. (2020). Coolcraig: A smart watch/phone application supporting co-regulation of children with adhd. In Extended Abstracts of the 2020 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, pages 1–7.
Fekete, G. e Lucero, A. (2019). P(l)ay attention! co-designing for and with children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (adhd). In Human-Computer Interaction – INTERACT 2019: 17th IFIP TC 13 International Conference, Paphos, Cyprus, September 2–6, 2019, Proceedings, Part I, pages 368–386, Berlin, Heidelberg. Springer-Verlag.
Ferreira, P. V. C. (2011). Uma revisão teórica sobre o transtorno de déficit de atenção e hiperatividade (TDAH) e estratégias educacionais de atendimento ao aluno com TDAH. Revista de Psicologia, 2(2):57–75.
Gil, A. C. (2017). Como elaborar projetos de pesquisa, volume 6. Atlas São Paulo.
Harpin, V. A. (2005). The effect of adhd on the life of an individual, their family, and community from preschool to adult life. Archives of disease in childhood, 90(suppl 1):i2–i7.
Heckathorn, D. D. (2011). Comment: Snowball versus respondent-driven sampling. Sociological Methodology, 41(1):355–366. PMID: 22228916.
Jandre, C. R., Dal’Maria, F. C., Nardy, G. A., Guimarães, F. T., de Miranda, D. M., e Nobre, C. N. (2024a). Persuasive technology for managing the routine of families with children and adolescents with adhd: A user-centered approach. In Proceedings of the XXIII Brazilian Symposium on Human Factors in Computing Systems, pages 1–16.
Jandre, C. R. S., Villaça, A. A., Balbino, M. S., de Miranda, D. M., e Nobre, C. N. (2024b). Personas and socially aware design in the characterization of children and adolescents with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder: a technological and social approach. Universal Access in the Information Society, pages 1–18.
Kirchherr, J. e Charles, K. (2018). Enhancing the sample diversity of snowball samples: Recommendations from a research project on anti-dam movements in southeast asia. PLOS ONE, 13:e0201710.
Kofer, M. J., Sarver, D. E., Harmon, S. L., Moltisanti, A., Aduen, P. A., Soto, E. F., e Ferretti, N. (2018). Working memory and organizational skills problems in adhd. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 59(1):57–67.
Kusumasari, D., Junaedi, D., e Kaburuan, E. R. (2018). Designing an interactive learning application for adhd children. In MATEC Web of Conferences, volume 197, page 16008. EDP Sciences.
Leitch, S., Sciberras, E., Post, B., Gerner, B., Rinehart, N., Nicholson, J. M., e Evans, S. (2019). Experience of stress in parents of children with adhd: A qualitative study. International Journal of Qualitative Studies on Health and Well-being, 14(1):1690091.
Maia, M. I. R. e Confortin, H. (2015). TDAH e Aprendizagem: um desafio para a educação.
Melo, Á. H. S., Rivero, L., dos Santos, J. S., e da Silva Barreto, R. (2020). Personaut: A personas model for people with autism spectrum disorder. In Proceedings of the 19th Brazilian Symposium on Human Factors in Computing Systems, IHC-20, New York, NY, USA. Association for Computing Machinery.
Miklós, M., Futó, J., Komáromy, D., e Balázs, J. (2019). Executive function and attention performance in children with adhd: Effects of medication and comparison with typically developing children. International journal of environmental research and public health, 16(20):3822.
Neris, V. P. A., Rosa, J. C. S., Maciel, C., Pereira, V. C., Galvão, V. F., e Arruda, I. L. (2024). Grandihc-br 2025-2035-gc4: Sociocultural aspects in human-computer interaction. In Proceedings of the XXIII Brazilian Symposium on Human Factors in Computing Systems, pages 1–14.
Pace, L. A., Bruno, C., e Schwarz, J. O. (2025). Personas in scenario building: Integrating human-centred design methods in foresight. Futures, 166:103539.
Pina, L., Rowan, K., Roseway, A., Johns, P., Hayes, G. R., e Czerwinski, M. (2014). In situ cues for adhd parenting strategies using mobile technology. In Proceedings of the 8th International Conference on Pervasive Computing Technologies for Healthcare, pages 17–24.
Pruitt, J. e Grudin, J. (2003). Personas: Practice and Theory. In Proceedings of the 2003 Conference on Designing for User Experiences, DUX ’03, pages 1–15, New York, NY, USA. Association for Computing Machinery.
Ruxton, G. D. (2006). The unequal variance t-test is an underused alternative to Student’s t-test and the Mann–Whitney U test. Behavioral Ecology, 17(4):688–690.
Santos, J. L. A. (2017). TDAH-Transtorno de Déficit de Atenção e Hiperatividade: Intervenção Psicopedagógica. Ideias e Inovação-Lato Sensu, 4(1):115.
Santos, L. F. e Vasconcelos, L. A. (2010). Transtorno do déficit de atenção e hiperatividade em crianças: uma revisão interdisciplinar. Psicologia: Teoria e Pesquisa, 26(4):717–724.
Sardana, N., Shekoohi, S., Cornett, E. M., e Kaye, A. D. (2023). Chapter 6 - qualitative and quantitative research methods. In Kaye, A. D., Urman, R. D., Cornett, E. M., e Edinoff, A. N., editors, Substance Use and Addiction Research, pages 65–69. Academic Press.
Stefanidi, E., Schöning, J., Feger, S. S., Marshall, P., Rogers, Y., e Niess, J. (2022). Designing for care ecosystems: a literature review of technologies for children with adhd. In Proceedings of the 21st Annual ACM Interaction Design and Children Conference, pages 13–25.
Teixeira, P., Teixeira, L., Silva, S., e Eusébio, C. (2025). Technology-based approaches for accessible tourism: Using personas to understand stakeholders’ characteristics and motivations. Data and Information Management, page 100095.
Theule, J., Wiener, J., Tannock, R., e Jenkins, J. M. (2013). Parenting stress in families of children with adhd: A meta-analysis. Journal of emotional and behavioral disorders, 21(1):3–17.
Wöckl, B., Yildizoglu, U., Buber, I., Diaz, B. A., Kruijff, E., e Tscheligi, M. (2012). Basic Senior Personas: A Representative Design Tool Covering the Spectrum of European Older Adults. In Proceedings of the 14th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility, ASSETS ’12, pages 25–32, New York, NY, USA. Association for Computing Machinery.
American Psychiatric Association (2014). Manual Diagnóstico e Estatístico de Transtornos Mentais: DSM-5. Artmed, Porto Alegre. Tradução: Maria Inês Corrêa Nascimento, Paulo Henrique Machado, Regina Machado Garcez, Régis Pizzato e Sandra Maria Mallmann da Rosa.
Ayano, G., Demelash, S., Gizachew, Y., Tsegay, L., e Alat, R. (2023). The global prevalence of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder in children and adolescents: An umbrella review of meta-analyses. Journal of affective disorders.
Babinski, D. E. (2024). Sex differences in adhd: review and priorities for future research. Current psychiatry reports, 26(4):151–156.
Baranauskas, M. C. C. (2014). Social awareness in HCI. Interactions, 21(4):66–69.
Baranauskas, M. C. C., Pereira, R., e Bonacin, R. (2024). Socially aware systems design: a perspective towards technology-society coupling. AIS Transactions on Human-Computer Interaction, 16(1):80–109.
Barkley, R. A. (2013). Taking charge of ADHD: The complete, authoritative guide for parents. The Guilford Press, New York.
Beck, A. T. e Alford, B. A. (2011). Depressão: causas e tratamento. Artmed Editora, Porto Alegre, 2 edition. Tradução: Daniel Bueno.
Brey, P. e Søraker, J. H. (2009). Philosophy of computing and information technology. In Philosophy of Technology and Engineering Sciences, pages 1341–1407. Elsevier.
Brown, L. E., Tallon, M., Kendall, G., Boyes, M., e Myers, B. (2025). Parents’ experiences of raising 7-to 11-year-old children with adhd and perception of a proposed parenting program: A qualitative study. Journal of Attention Disorders, page 10870547241309526.
Bunford, N., Evans, S. W., e Wymbs, F. (2015). Adhd and emotion dysregulation among children and adolescents. Clinical Child and Family Psychology Review, 18:185–217.
Calde, S., Goodwin, K., e Reimann, R. (2002). Shs orcas: The first integrated information system for long-term healthcare facility management. In Case Studies of the CHI2002-AIGA Experience Design FORUM, CHI-02, pages 2–16, New York, NY, USA. Association for Computing Machinery.
Carvalho, L. R. e Pinto, P. M. (2023). A associação entre o uso de telas e o desenvolvimento infantil: uma revisão de literatura. Research, Society and Development, 12(4):e2812440885–e2812440885.
Cibrian, F. L., Lakes, K. D., Schuck, S. E. B., e Hayes, G. R. (2022). The potential for emerging technologies to support self-regulation in children with adhd: A literature review. International Journal of Child-Computer Interaction, 31:100421.
Cooke, R. e Jones, A. (2017). Recruiting adult participants to physical activity intervention studies using sport: a systematic review. BMJ Open Sport & Exercise Medicine, 3(1).
Cooper, A. (2004). The inmates are running the asylum: Why high-tech products drive us crazy and how to restore the sanity, volume 2. Sams Publishing, Indianapolis.
Courage, C. e Baxter, K. (2005). Understanding Your Users: A Practical Guide to User Requirements Methods, Tools, and Techniques. Morgan Kaufmann Publishers Inc., San Francisco, CA, USA, 1st edition.
de Melo, T. M., de Carvalho, A. S., e de Andrade, L. G. (2022). O uso do metilfenidato em pacientes com tdah. Revista Ibero-Americana de Humanidades, Ciências e Educação, 8(4):891–900.
Delacre, M., Lakens, D., e Leys, C. (2017). Why psychologists should by default use Welch’s t-test instead of Student’s t-test. International Review of Social Psychology, 30(1):92–101.
Doan, M., Cibrian, F. L., Jang, A., Khare, N., Chang, S., Li, A., Schuck, S., Lakes, K. D., e Hayes, G. R. (2020). Coolcraig: A smart watch/phone application supporting co-regulation of children with adhd. In Extended Abstracts of the 2020 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, pages 1–7.
Fekete, G. e Lucero, A. (2019). P(l)ay attention! co-designing for and with children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (adhd). In Human-Computer Interaction – INTERACT 2019: 17th IFIP TC 13 International Conference, Paphos, Cyprus, September 2–6, 2019, Proceedings, Part I, pages 368–386, Berlin, Heidelberg. Springer-Verlag.
Ferreira, P. V. C. (2011). Uma revisão teórica sobre o transtorno de déficit de atenção e hiperatividade (TDAH) e estratégias educacionais de atendimento ao aluno com TDAH. Revista de Psicologia, 2(2):57–75.
Gil, A. C. (2017). Como elaborar projetos de pesquisa, volume 6. Atlas São Paulo.
Harpin, V. A. (2005). The effect of adhd on the life of an individual, their family, and community from preschool to adult life. Archives of disease in childhood, 90(suppl 1):i2–i7.
Heckathorn, D. D. (2011). Comment: Snowball versus respondent-driven sampling. Sociological Methodology, 41(1):355–366. PMID: 22228916.
Jandre, C. R., Dal’Maria, F. C., Nardy, G. A., Guimarães, F. T., de Miranda, D. M., e Nobre, C. N. (2024a). Persuasive technology for managing the routine of families with children and adolescents with adhd: A user-centered approach. In Proceedings of the XXIII Brazilian Symposium on Human Factors in Computing Systems, pages 1–16.
Jandre, C. R. S., Villaça, A. A., Balbino, M. S., de Miranda, D. M., e Nobre, C. N. (2024b). Personas and socially aware design in the characterization of children and adolescents with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder: a technological and social approach. Universal Access in the Information Society, pages 1–18.
Kirchherr, J. e Charles, K. (2018). Enhancing the sample diversity of snowball samples: Recommendations from a research project on anti-dam movements in southeast asia. PLOS ONE, 13:e0201710.
Kofer, M. J., Sarver, D. E., Harmon, S. L., Moltisanti, A., Aduen, P. A., Soto, E. F., e Ferretti, N. (2018). Working memory and organizational skills problems in adhd. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 59(1):57–67.
Kusumasari, D., Junaedi, D., e Kaburuan, E. R. (2018). Designing an interactive learning application for adhd children. In MATEC Web of Conferences, volume 197, page 16008. EDP Sciences.
Leitch, S., Sciberras, E., Post, B., Gerner, B., Rinehart, N., Nicholson, J. M., e Evans, S. (2019). Experience of stress in parents of children with adhd: A qualitative study. International Journal of Qualitative Studies on Health and Well-being, 14(1):1690091.
Maia, M. I. R. e Confortin, H. (2015). TDAH e Aprendizagem: um desafio para a educação.
Melo, Á. H. S., Rivero, L., dos Santos, J. S., e da Silva Barreto, R. (2020). Personaut: A personas model for people with autism spectrum disorder. In Proceedings of the 19th Brazilian Symposium on Human Factors in Computing Systems, IHC-20, New York, NY, USA. Association for Computing Machinery.
Miklós, M., Futó, J., Komáromy, D., e Balázs, J. (2019). Executive function and attention performance in children with adhd: Effects of medication and comparison with typically developing children. International journal of environmental research and public health, 16(20):3822.
Neris, V. P. A., Rosa, J. C. S., Maciel, C., Pereira, V. C., Galvão, V. F., e Arruda, I. L. (2024). Grandihc-br 2025-2035-gc4: Sociocultural aspects in human-computer interaction. In Proceedings of the XXIII Brazilian Symposium on Human Factors in Computing Systems, pages 1–14.
Pace, L. A., Bruno, C., e Schwarz, J. O. (2025). Personas in scenario building: Integrating human-centred design methods in foresight. Futures, 166:103539.
Pina, L., Rowan, K., Roseway, A., Johns, P., Hayes, G. R., e Czerwinski, M. (2014). In situ cues for adhd parenting strategies using mobile technology. In Proceedings of the 8th International Conference on Pervasive Computing Technologies for Healthcare, pages 17–24.
Pruitt, J. e Grudin, J. (2003). Personas: Practice and Theory. In Proceedings of the 2003 Conference on Designing for User Experiences, DUX ’03, pages 1–15, New York, NY, USA. Association for Computing Machinery.
Ruxton, G. D. (2006). The unequal variance t-test is an underused alternative to Student’s t-test and the Mann–Whitney U test. Behavioral Ecology, 17(4):688–690.
Santos, J. L. A. (2017). TDAH-Transtorno de Déficit de Atenção e Hiperatividade: Intervenção Psicopedagógica. Ideias e Inovação-Lato Sensu, 4(1):115.
Santos, L. F. e Vasconcelos, L. A. (2010). Transtorno do déficit de atenção e hiperatividade em crianças: uma revisão interdisciplinar. Psicologia: Teoria e Pesquisa, 26(4):717–724.
Sardana, N., Shekoohi, S., Cornett, E. M., e Kaye, A. D. (2023). Chapter 6 - qualitative and quantitative research methods. In Kaye, A. D., Urman, R. D., Cornett, E. M., e Edinoff, A. N., editors, Substance Use and Addiction Research, pages 65–69. Academic Press.
Stefanidi, E., Schöning, J., Feger, S. S., Marshall, P., Rogers, Y., e Niess, J. (2022). Designing for care ecosystems: a literature review of technologies for children with adhd. In Proceedings of the 21st Annual ACM Interaction Design and Children Conference, pages 13–25.
Teixeira, P., Teixeira, L., Silva, S., e Eusébio, C. (2025). Technology-based approaches for accessible tourism: Using personas to understand stakeholders’ characteristics and motivations. Data and Information Management, page 100095.
Theule, J., Wiener, J., Tannock, R., e Jenkins, J. M. (2013). Parenting stress in families of children with adhd: A meta-analysis. Journal of emotional and behavioral disorders, 21(1):3–17.
Wöckl, B., Yildizoglu, U., Buber, I., Diaz, B. A., Kruijff, E., e Tscheligi, M. (2012). Basic Senior Personas: A Representative Design Tool Covering the Spectrum of European Older Adults. In Proceedings of the 14th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility, ASSETS ’12, pages 25–32, New York, NY, USA. Association for Computing Machinery.
Published
2025-09-08
How to Cite
JANDRE, Caroline; DE MIRANDA, Débora; NOBRE, Cristiane.
How Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder Shapes Parenting: An Approach Grounded in Personas and Socially Aware Design. In: BRAZILIAN SYMPOSIUM ON HUMAN FACTORS IN COMPUTATIONAL SYSTEMS (IHC), 24. , 2025, Belo Horizonte/MG.
Anais [...].
Porto Alegre: Sociedade Brasileira de Computação,
2025
.
p. 1675-1698.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.5753/ihc.2025.10976.
