Evidence map›Paper›PMID 41916949›Full record

ArticleTranslational psychiatry2026

ADHD polygenic risk predicts neural signatures of cognitive control: Evidence from midfrontal theta dynamics.

Ümit Aydin, Ziye Wang, Máté Gyurkovics, Amy Tong, Grace Cullen, Sumayyah Ahmed, Jason Palmer, Gráinne McLoughlin

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In one paragraph

Article in Translational psychiatry, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.

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1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

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2 · The registry

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3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

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4 · The record

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5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

8 authors.

Ümit AydinSchool of Psychology & Clinical Language Sciences, University of Reading, Reading, United Kingdom.ORCID http://orcid.org/0000-0002-6327-7811
Ziye WangSocial, Genetic & Developmental Psychiatry Centre, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience, King's College London, London, United Kingdom.
Máté GyurkovicsSchool of Psychology, University of East Anglia, Norwich, United Kingdom.
Amy TongDepartment of Psychological Medicine, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience, King's College London, London, United Kingdom.ORCID http://orcid.org/0009-0006-7531-4161
Grace CullenSocial, Genetic & Developmental Psychiatry Centre, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience, King's College London, London, United Kingdom.ORCID http://orcid.org/0009-0007-8394-8479
Sumayyah AhmedSocial, Genetic & Developmental Psychiatry Centre, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience, King's College London, London, United Kingdom.ORCID http://orcid.org/0009-0002-4316-5844
Jason PalmerSchool of Mathematical and Data Sciences, West Virginia University, Morgantown, WV, USA.
Gráinne McLoughlinSocial, Genetic & Developmental Psychiatry Centre, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience, King's College London, London, United Kingdom. grainne.mcloughlin@kcl.ac.uk.ORCID http://orcid.org/0000-0001-5785-9527

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Cognitive control mechanisms ensure goal-directedness in behaviour. Difficulties in cognitive control are well-established in conditions such as attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and autism. On the neural level, midfrontal theta (4-8 Hz) activity has emerged as a reliable correlate of cognitive control processes. Previous findings showed alterations in theta-based signals in both ADHD and autism, most notably an increase in the variability of theta phases across trials in cognitive control tasks, which was predictive of increased response time variability (RTV) as well. Crucially, recent work on twin studies has provided strong evidence for the genetic underpinning of these associations. Here, for the first time, we investigated whether polygenic scores (PGS) for ADHD and autism can predict RTV and EEG-derived theta-based measures of cognitive control in 454 participants. We found that PGS for ADHD, but not autism, accounted for a significant proportion of the variance in theta phase variability, captured via inter-trial coherence (ITC), in the well-standardised arrow-flanker task (2.5% of total variance, corresponding to 3.3% of the reliable variance). Furthermore, theta-ITC showed excellent test-retest reliability in our sample, indicating psychometric robustness, which in turn, further strengthens our findings. These results provide robust evidence linking genetic risk to neural measures and suggest that core dysregulation of the temporal coordination of control processes in ADHD is under genetic influence.

Indexed as

Attention Deficit Disorder with HyperactivityAutistic DisorderCognitionExecutive FunctionFrontal LobeTheta RhythmAdolescentChildElectroencephalographyFemaleGenetic Risk ScoreHumansMaleMultifactorial InheritanceReaction TimeReproducibility of Results

Identifiers

PMID41916949
PMCPMC13039785

What Socratic holds

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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the Socratic graph.