Introduction

Many disorders of early childhood are transient and are not predictive of psychopathology in later life (Kohlberg, La Cross, & Ricks, 1972). This is clearly not the case for the hyperactive child syndrome. The hyperactive child presents a remarkably immutable syndrome that forecasts an ominous picture of the future. The clinical picture often worsens as the child grows older, with resulting adolescent problems of academic failure and serious antisocial behavior.

Although many follow-up studies of hyperactive children have revealed a substantial subgroup (25%) to be delinquent (Huessy, Metoyer, & Townsend, 1974; Mendelson, Johnson, & Stewart, 1971; Weiss, Minde, Werry, Douglas, & Nemeth, 1971), most studies are flawed by one or more of the following weaknesses: inadequate or missing control group; lack of information as to the nature, frequency, and type of offenses committed; absence of official arrest data; and a substantial number of subjects lost to follow-up. It is generally thought that the teenage delinquency rate among former hyperactive children is higher than that among nonhyperactive control children. However, because of the above-mentioned weaknesses, how much higher the delinquency rate is among the hyperactive group is not known. The amount of predictive information the diagnosis of hyperactive child syndrome conveys regarding teenage delinquency is related to the question of how much higher the rate of teenage delinquency is among former hyperactive children than among nonhyperactive control children. In other words, if the diagnosis adds predictive information, children diagnosed as hyperactive should have an outcome substantially different from those who did not fit the diagnosis.