01/ 06The clinical foundation
Barkley's model, and what it actually says.
The frame across the catalog is Russell Barkley's executive-function model — specifically the 1997 unifying theory and the 2012 revision. It says ADHD is, at the cognitive level, a delay-aversion and behavioral-inhibition disorder, and that the surface symptoms — distractibility, time blindness, emotional flooding — are downstream of a single underlying mechanism. The model is the working hypothesis. It is not the only model in the field, and the catalog says that on every kit cover.
The kits also draw on Edward Hallowell's clinical descriptions (specifically Driven to Distraction and Delivered from Distraction), Peg Dawson and Richard Guare's executive-skills taxonomy from Smart but Scattered, and the Cortese 2018 network meta-analysis on stimulant efficacy. None of these is treated as gospel. They're treated as Tier-A sources where the methodology is sound and as Tier-B (clinical synthesis) where the work is a respected book or commentary rather than a primary trial.
Where the literature is thin — rejection-sensitive dysphoria as a measurable construct, hyperfocus as a quantified state — the kits say so. The pattern is named, the mechanism is offered as a working hypothesis, and the citation block lists what's available rather than inventing what isn't.
If a claim can't be cited, it gets labeled as a pattern observation. Patterns are useful. They aren't the same as evidence.
— The citation rule
02/ 06The ten AFMs and their citations
Each failure mode has its receipts.
Below: the ten AI Failure Modes the catalog is sorted by, with the single key citation each one rests on. Every kit ships its own full citation block in the PDF. The page at /methodology/ explains how the ten AFMs were derived; the table here says what holds them up.
Adjacent literature feeds in where it earns the page. Bijlenga 2019 on delayed sleep-phase syndrome is the spine of the night-shift kit (PMID 30906744). Cortese 2018 in The Lancet Psychiatry (PMID 30097390) anchors any kit copy that makes a claim about medication response. Hechtman 2016 (the MTA follow-up; PMID 26772300) is the source for late-diagnosis and lifespan-persistence framing. The full PubMed list, with retraction watch flags, sits in the PDF of every paid kit.
03/ 06What we don't claim
What a citation isn't.
A citation is not a license to overclaim. The catalog cites carefully, and just as carefully says what the citation does not authorize.
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Not a diagnosis.
Nothing on this page or in any kit is a diagnostic instrument. The studies cited describe populations with formally diagnosed ADHD. A reader who suspects ADHD belongs with a clinician — the kits are a different kind of object.
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Not a substitute for a clinician.
A worksheet that maps to Barkley's executive-function model is a worksheet. It is not a treatment plan, and it cannot replace the relationship between a person and the clinician who actually knows them. The kits say so on their first page and on their cover.
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Not a settled science.
The ADHD literature is mature in some places (Barkley's executive-function model, the Cortese network meta-analysis on stimulants) and young in others (rejection-sensitive dysphoria as a measurable construct, hyperfocus as a quantified state). Kits cite the mature work as evidence and the young work as a working hypothesis. They are not labeled the same way.
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Not "research-backed" as a marketing flag.
"Research-backed" gets used as a credibility wrapper across the productivity industry, often pointing at a single study with eight subjects. The kits don't use the phrase. They list the citation. A reader can audit the citation. That is the only credibility move the catalog makes.
04/ 06How citations stay current
Four passes a year. Receipts at /changes/.
The audit cycle runs every three months. The cadence is fixed because the alternative — auditing only when a journalist asks — produces stale citations and silent decay. The four quarterly passes do roughly the same thing each time.
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PMID resolution check.
Every PubMed ID across every kit gets re-resolved. If a paper has been retracted, withdrawn, or re-classified, the kit chapter that depends on it is flagged for revision before the next ship date.
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Newer-meta-analysis sweep.
If a network meta-analysis has been published that supersedes the one the kit cites, the kit is updated. This is most common for stimulant-efficacy claims, where the field updates roughly every five years.
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Clinical-synthesis refresh.
Tier-B citations — Barkley, Hallowell, Dawson and Guare — are checked against newer editions of the same author's work. When a 2024 edition supersedes a 2012 edition, the kit cites the newer one and notes the change.
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Pattern-observation reconciliation.
Tier-C operator observations (the named-moment hooks the kits use to help recognition) are tested against any newer sample data. If a pattern fails to hold up at a larger N, the kit copy is softened or the pattern is removed.
The change log is at /changes/ and is appended within seven days of any update. Readers get every revised version free, in the same downloads folder where they got the original. There is no second purchase.
05/ 06The retraction protocol
What happens when a study fails.
Research gets retracted. It happens regularly, and in ADHD research it has happened to studies the field once treated as foundational. The catalog has a written protocol for that.
Step one. The retraction is recorded in a public retraction-watch entry on the kit's audit page within seven days of discovery. The kit is flagged "under revision" on the buy page.
Step two. The kit chapter that cited the retracted work is rewritten, replacing the retracted citation with a still-valid one if the underlying claim survives, or removing the claim entirely if it doesn't. If the claim was central to the kit, the kit gets pulled until it can be rebuilt around different evidence.
Step three. Every reader of the affected kit gets the revised version emailed to them, free, with a one-paragraph note explaining what was retracted and what changed. The note doesn't apologize and doesn't perform — it explains. The change goes on the public revision log.
The protocol is the same when an underlying meta-analysis is updated and supersedes one the kits depend on. The only difference is the timeline: a meta-analysis update is usually a planned revision rather than an emergency one.
If we wouldn't ship a kit on retracted research, we won't keep selling one that becomes that.
— The retraction rule
06/ 06Where to read the primary sources
The books and papers worth the read.
If you want to verify the work behind the kits, or you're a clinician who'd rather read the sources than read about them, the foundational texts are below. The catalog links to /amazon/ entries where they exist, and to publisher pages where they don't.
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Executive function
Smart but Scattered
Peg Dawson and Richard Guare. Guilford Press. The clinical executive-skills taxonomy that maps onto AFM-3 (Re-Entry) and AFM-5 (Time Blindness). Plain language, written for clinicians and adults alike.
View on the Amazon list → -
Clinical synthesis
Driven to Distraction
Edward Hallowell and John Ratey. The 1994 first edition (and 2011 revision) is the clinical description that taught a generation of clinicians what adult ADHD looked like. Cited as Tier B across the catalog.
View on the Amazon list → -
Executive-function model
Executive Functions: What They Are, How They Work, and Why They Evolved
Russell Barkley. Guilford Press, 2012. The unifying executive-function theory the catalog frames every kit against. Dense, but the working chapters earn the read.
View on the Amazon list → -
Stimulant efficacy
Cortese et al., 2018
Network meta-analysis of pharmacological treatments for adult ADHD. The Lancet Psychiatry. PMID 30097390. Open-access via PubMed Central. The single most-cited paper in the catalog when a kit references medication response.
Read on PubMed → -
Sleep / DSPS
Bijlenga et al., 2019
Delayed sleep-phase syndrome and circadian patterns in ADHD adults. PMID 30906744. The basis of the night-shift kit and any kit chapter that touches chronotype or shift work.
Read on PubMed → -
Reward / dopamine
Volkow et al., 2009
Reward-circuit and dopamine-signaling differences in ADHD adults. JAMA. PMID 19738093. The mechanism citation behind any kit chapter that discusses task-initiation friction or the trust-blowback failure mode.
Read on PubMed →