From a medical viewpoint, hyperfocus is thought to result from abnormally low levels of dopamine, a neurotransmitter that is particularly active in the brain’s frontal lobes. This dopamine deficiency makes it hard to “shift gears” to take up boring-but-necessary tasks.[citat
Hyperfocus is not recognised by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV-TR) and no article using the term appears in PubMed. Psychiatry describes only the distraction aspect of hyperfocus, referring to ADHD as ‘inattentiveness and impulsiveness’.
However, not all aspects of hyperfocus are negative, and while not adressing it specifically, professional psychiatry does not completely discount the existence of hyperfocus.
Many adults with ADHD attribute accomplishments in their lives to this mental ability. Besides hyperfocus, various special abilities have been suggested to occur in ADHD, including vigilance, response-readiness, enthusiasm, and flexibility. But current ADHD research does not recognize these characteristics. Greater creativity has also been suggested, but formal measures of this are no higher in children with ADHD than in control groups.
Nevertheless, psychiatric research suggests that there are several reasons for the persistence of the notion that people with ADHD have the ability to hyperfocus, such as the well-recognised comorbidity of ADHD with autism spectrum disorders, of which excessive focus is a part. Special abilities do occur in some ADHD people, so it is easy to generalize from this minority to the whole ADHD group. ADHD is sometimes regarded as a disorder that is remarkably common (affecting 4-8% of school age children), but primarily genetically determined.
As ADHD in adults is a relatively new area of learning in comparison with the condition in children, many clinicians feel that hyperfocus is an aspect of adult ADHD which is not well understood and merits more thorough research.
A positive aspect of hyperfocus might be the ability to use detachment from ordinary mentality to create new approaches to familiar situations. It may also improve learning speed and comprehension.
On the other hand, it sometimes presents a challenge to common teaching and parenting techniques. Schools and parents generally expect obedience from children and reward them for it, but hyperfocused children do not always cooperate under these circumstances. This can be overcome with investments of time and effort by the teacher or parent, but it is not always possible to spend a lot of time focusing on one child in a typical classroom situation.
Hyperfocus
The term hyperfocus is not in common use among academics, and seldom appears in peer-reviewed articles. However, related terms such as concentration, absorption, and ‘focused attention’ are widely used.
From a neurodiversity perspective, hyperfocus is a mental ability that is a natural expression of personality. However, hyperfocus can also be regarded as a psychiatric diagnosis, as a distraction from reality and a symptom of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) or autism spectrum disorder.
Some people say that hyperfocus is an important element of meditation. In common parlance, hyperfocus is sometimes referred to as “zoning out.”
Hyperfocus is an intense form of mental concentration or visualization that focuses consciousness on a narrow subject, or beyond objective reality and onto subjective mental planes, daydreams, concepts, fiction, the imagination, and other objects of the mind.
Developers of computer software reference getting into a flow state when developing in an undistracted state.[9] Stock market operators often use the term “in the pipe” to describe the psychological state of flow when trading during high volume days and market corrections.
Game designers, particularly video and computer games, benefit from integration of Flow principles into gameplay design.[8]
Csíkszentmihályi may have been the first to describe this concept in Western psychology, but as he himself readily acknowledges he was most certainly not the first to quantify the concept of Flow or develop applications based on the concept.
For millennia, practitioners of Eastern religions such as Hinduism, Buddhism and Taoism have honed the discipline of overcoming the duality of self and object as a central feature of spiritual development. Eastern spiritual practitioners have developed a very thorough and holistic set of theories around overcoming duality of self and object, tested and refined through spiritual practice instead of the systematic rigor and controls of modern science.
The phrase “being at one with things” is a metaphor of Csíkszentmihályi’s Flow concept. Practitioners of the varied schools of Zen Buddhism apply concepts similar to Flow to aid their mastery of art forms, including, in the case of Japanese Zen Buddhism, Aikido, Kendo and Ikebana.
The concept of “being in the zone” during an athletic performance fits within Csíkszentmihályi’s description of the Flow experience, and theories and applications of “being in the zone” and its relationship with athletic competitive advantage are topics studied in the field of sport psychology.[4]
Timothy Gallwey’s influential works on the inner game of sports such as golf and tennis described the mental coaching and attitudes which were required to get into the zone and so fully internalise mastery of the sport.[5]
Roy Palmer suggests that “being in the zone” may also influence movement patterns as better integration of the conscious and subconscious reflex functions improves coordination. Many athletes describe the effortless nature of their performance whilst achieving personal bests - see references.
The Formula 1 driver Ayrton Senna, who during qualifying for the 1988 Monaco Grand Prix gives a prime example.[citation needed] “I was already on pole, [...] and I just kept going. Suddenly I was nearly two seconds faster than anybody else, including my team mate with the same car. And suddenly I realised that I was no longer driving the car consciously. I was driving it by a kind of instinct, only I was in a different dimension. It was like I was in a tunnel. Not only the tunnel under the hotel but the whole circuit was a tunnel. I was just going and going, more and more and more and more. I was way over the limit but still able to find even more.”
This is exactly what Csikszentmihalyi means in regard to flow. It is a perfect example of optimal experience and the uses of talent. When challenges and skills are simultaneously above average, a broadly positive experience emerges.[6] Simms threw 22 completions out of 25 attempts for 268 yards and many still say it was the best game ever by a quarterback on the grandest stage. He had maximum concentration. Csikszentmihalyi and Jeremy Hunter state that concentration is a vital element in becoming completely involved with the present. So one must concentrate to achieve flow. Also a sense of control is vital to earning a flow state. Control, however, seems simultaneously effortless and masterful. Control and concentration also manifest with a transcendence of normal awareness. One aspect of this transcendence is the loss of self-consciousness.[7] Simply put, an athlete’s focus is so intense and play elevated, they’re unstoppable.