ADHD, Executive Functions, and AI: A New Era in Treatment

AI for ADHD: Revolutionizing Focus and Management

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Can artificial intelligence (AI) become a powerful treatment tool for kids and adults with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD)? If we view ADHD as a disorder of executive functioning, brain-based skills such as working memory, flexibility, time management, organization, and self-control, AI could become a potent self-management resource. Viewing AI as an agent that supports ineffective executive skills may open the door for its widespread use for many individuals with ADHD. Treating individual skills, rather than the entity of ADHD, is a methodology for technologies and behavioral interventions to improve skills including time management, organization, working memory, and emotional regulation. Technologies such as wearables, video games, AI, and virtual reality (VR) are increasingly a part of ADHD management. They might also be used by many children who don’t have a formal diagnosis of ADHD but exhibit executive-functioning deficits such as difficulty with planning and foresight, poor time-management skills, and inflexible problem-solving (Doulou et al., 2025).

AI as a treatment tool for ADHD offers the possibility of more personalized support and treatment. For example, over the past year, AI tools have been considered in treating ADHD and helping kids with learning disabilities. Salman Khan, the founder of the Khan Academy and the author of the new book Brave New Words: How AI Will Revolutionize Education (and Why That's a Good Thing), views AI as a tool that can provide low-cost one-on-one, individualized tutoring to students who could never otherwise afford to have this service (Khan, 2024). Many of these same kids struggle with ADHD and executive functioning disorders.

Treating ADHD With Video Game-Based Technology

AI may be the latest and greatest, but it is not the only technology tool for helping kids and adults with ADHD. Treating problems with executive functions and ADHD with video games and other digital tools is not a new phenomenon. Older research utilized a computer training program called AIXTENT to enhance four components of attention: alertness, vigilance, selective attention, and divided attention. Findings indicated a generalized improvement in attention skills, including vigilance, divided attention, and cognitive flexibility (Tucha et al., 2011). Another study used different video games to reveal that brain-training games can improve executive-functioning skills such as working memory and processing speed in young adults. Puzzle games (in this case, Tetris) were observed to enhance attention and visuospatial ability compared to playing a brain-training game (Nguyen et al., 2021).

There is now substantial evidence that video-game-like technologies can improve working memory skills, which are frequently identified as the most critical executive functioning deficit observed in children with ADHD. Research from the Karolinska Institute in Sweden suggests that this type of training leads to structural changes in the brain that directly improve the symptoms of ADHD (Klingberg, 2010). A study conducted in 2009 found that treatment with video game-based working memory training resulted in enhanced working memory and concentration but also improved a variety of academic skills, including reading and math. This study also suggested that working memory training could improve self-awareness and strategic thinking, both considered executive skills (Holmes et al., 2009).

More recent was the U.S. Food and Drug Administration clearance of EndeavorRx, a prescription video game designed to improve attention function in children with ADHD. A study published in The Lancet Digital Health by Kollins et al. (2020) demonstrated that EndeavorRx improved objective measures of attention in children with ADHD compared to an active control. This marks a significant step forward in the recognition and use of video games as a legitimate therapeutic tool for ADHD.

Several studies conducted by Shawn Green and colleagues have explored the connection between skills used in video games and enhanced attention. Their work has shown that action video game players exhibit improved attentional control, working memory, and cognitive flexibility compared to nongamers. These findings suggest that the dynamic and engaging nature of certain video games can train and strengthen the cognitive skills underlying attention and executive function (Green & Bavelier, 2012).

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Technology Tools as a Treatment for Executive Functioning Skills

In addition to these developments, other products and digital therapeutics have emerged that utilize video game technology to address executive function challenges. These include various apps and online platforms that offer cognitive training exercises and games designed to target specific skills such as working memory, planning, and impulse control.

While research on the use of video games to improve executive functions and ADHD is ongoing and evolving, there are some common themes in the current studies. First, engagement with video games and other screen-based technologies provides a fertile ground for learning. Second, video game play needs to be adaptive and to become more challenging to achieve cognitive gains. Third, making the games engaging, fun, and motivating contributes to developing executive-functioning skills. And, finally, building opportunities to generalize the game-based skills to real-world activities improves the likelihood of long-term effects.

The Future: AI, VR, and Wearables as Treatment for ADHD

Many researchers and companies are developing technologies to enhance executive function skills in children, particularly those with ADHD. AI offers intriguing possibilities. AI-based interventions for executive function in ADHD could include educational apps that can adapt in real time to a child's academic level and attention patterns. AI tutoring apps already use personalized encouragement to sustain attention and effort. AI could be used to analyze a child's gameplay to assess specific executive function weaknesses and then suggest activities that would practice these skills.

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VR is already being used to help kids with ADHD and may offer unique real-world-like practice opportunities for executive function skills. VR environments can be designed to simulate real-world situations that require strong executive function skills, such as navigating a busy classroom, managing a schedule, or handling social interactions. Future VR games could require players to manage their time to complete daily tasks in a simulated school environment and use executive functioning skills such as time management, planning, and sustained attention (Goh et al., 2024).

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Wearable technology also holds potential. Smartwatches or other devices could monitor physiological indicators of attention, such as heart rate variability or brainwave activity. Wearables also offer private but effective alerts to inform a child to do their homework, pay attention, or assist with weak working memory skills.

While emerging technologies are not a cure for ADHD, they can support and improve many executive functioning skills. AI, in particular, may be adapted for addressing multiple executive deficits that characterize ADHD. However, AI and other technologies should not be considered a replacement for established evidence-based treatments for ADHD, such as medication and behavioral therapy. Rather, they can be used as complementary or adjunctive interventions to enhance and support these traditional approaches in the treatment of ADHD.