Susceptibility to task-irrelevant auditory distractors in relation to visual working memory in children with and without attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder

Abstract

Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is a prevalent neurodevelopmental disorder associated with increased distractibility. Previous research has reported that susceptibility to task-irrelevant visual distraction is linked with visual working memory (WM) capacity in adults. Here, we examined how neural susceptibility to task-irrelevant auditory distractors related to visual WM capacity in children with and without ADHD. Across two experiments, electroencephalography (EEG) signals were recorded from 146 Chinese children aged 7–15 (63 with ADHD, 23% girls; collected in 2022–2024), during which they performed visual tasks of varying difficulty with auditory distractors. The mismatch negativity (MMN) amplitude was measured as neural susceptibility to auditory distractors, and a K-score was calculated to assess visual WM capacity. In typically developing (TD) children, those with higher visual WM capacity showed less susceptibility to auditory distractors under high audiovisual competition (r = 0.494), whereas this relation reversed under low competition (r = −0.319). Conversely, in children with ADHD, lower visual WM capacity predicted higher susceptibility under both high (r = 0.442) and low competition (r = 0.326). These findings indicate that susceptibility to task-irrelevant auditory distraction is related to visual WM capacity in children, but the patterns differ between typical and atypical neurodevelopment and are modulated by audiovisual competition.