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"Ett misslyckande i kvarten" - En kvalitativ studie om hur kvinnor med ADHD upplever sin vardag och sina sociala relationer

Sierra Gustavsson, Lorena LU (2022) SOPA63 20212
School of Social Work
Abstract
Women with ADHD are statistically diagnosed later in life than men. Previous studies have shown that girls and women with neuropsychiatric disabilities tend to hide their symptoms to appear normative. It is discussed that girls may be judged harder than boys for expressing some of the common ADHD-symptoms due to stereotypical gender norms. One of the consequences of women getting diagnosed as adults is that they grew up lacking an explanation to their difficulties and thus also lacked adequate treatment and support. The aim for this study was to explore how five women with ADHD experience their everyday life and how they are affected by andhandle their social relations. Using interviews with five women diagnosed with ADHD, analyzed with... (More)
Women with ADHD are statistically diagnosed later in life than men. Previous studies have shown that girls and women with neuropsychiatric disabilities tend to hide their symptoms to appear normative. It is discussed that girls may be judged harder than boys for expressing some of the common ADHD-symptoms due to stereotypical gender norms. One of the consequences of women getting diagnosed as adults is that they grew up lacking an explanation to their difficulties and thus also lacked adequate treatment and support. The aim for this study was to explore how five women with ADHD experience their everyday life and how they are affected by andhandle their social relations. Using interviews with five women diagnosed with ADHD, analyzed with the theoretical framework of stigma and gender norms three main themes were found. These showed that the participants experience everyday life as chaotic, stressful and challenging. The women experienced palpable amounts of stereotypical and normative expectations of how they should act and live from both individuals and society as a whole. This added to everyday life stress while also putting them in a position where they experienced a double social stigma as they felt perceived as both “bad women” and “lazy people” in general. This had in most cases led to low self esteem and the women forcing themselves to hide their symptoms i.e. “masking”. The study found the participants highly verbal and knowledgeable about their diagnosis which speaks for further studies investigating the needs of this group on a larger scale. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
author
Sierra Gustavsson, Lorena LU
supervisor
organization
alternative title
"I have one failure every fifteen minutes" - A qualitative study of how adult women with ADHD experience and handle their everyday life and social relations
course
SOPA63 20212
year
type
M2 - Bachelor Degree
subject
keywords
Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder, Adult Women, Gender Studies, Stigma, Social Constructionism
language
Swedish
id
9072119
date added to LUP
2022-02-08 16:05:39
date last changed
2022-02-08 16:05:39
@misc{9072119,
  abstract     = {{Women with ADHD are statistically diagnosed later in life than men. Previous studies have shown that girls and women with neuropsychiatric disabilities tend to hide their symptoms to appear normative. It is discussed that girls may be judged harder than boys for expressing some of the common ADHD-symptoms due to stereotypical gender norms. One of the consequences of women getting diagnosed as adults is that they grew up lacking an explanation to their difficulties and thus also lacked adequate treatment and support. The aim for this study was to explore how five women with ADHD experience their everyday life and how they are affected by andhandle their social relations. Using interviews with five women diagnosed with ADHD, analyzed with the theoretical framework of stigma and gender norms three main themes were found. These showed that the participants experience everyday life as chaotic, stressful and challenging. The women experienced palpable amounts of stereotypical and normative expectations of how they should act and live from both individuals and society as a whole. This added to everyday life stress while also putting them in a position where they experienced a double social stigma as they felt perceived as both “bad women” and “lazy people” in general. This had in most cases led to low self esteem and the women forcing themselves to hide their symptoms i.e. “masking”. The study found the participants highly verbal and knowledgeable about their diagnosis which speaks for further studies investigating the needs of this group on a larger scale.}},
  author       = {{Sierra Gustavsson, Lorena}},
  language     = {{swe}},
  note         = {{Student Paper}},
  title        = {{"Ett misslyckande i kvarten" - En kvalitativ studie om hur kvinnor med ADHD upplever sin vardag och sina sociala relationer}},
  year         = {{2022}},
}