---
title: "Psych News Alert: Children of Parents With Bipolar Disorder at Risk of ADHD and Early Onset Bipolar, Study Suggests"
description: Children who have a parent with bipolar disorder are more likely to develop attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) during their pr...
image: https://alert.psychnews.org/hubfs/Imported_Blog_Media/mother_child_iStock-854450808-Jun-24-2025-09-35-58-0118-PM.jpg
---

 4/2/21 12:00 AM

# Children of Parents With Bipolar Disorder at Risk of ADHD and Early Onset Bipolar, Study Suggests

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Children who have a parent with bipolar disorder are more likely to develop attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) during their preschool years than children with no family history of bipolar disorder, reports a [study](https://www.jaacap.org/article/S0890-8567(21)00180-5/fulltext#seccesectitle0016) in *Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry*. The study also found that these children were more likely to develop symptoms of bipolar disorder as they grew older.

“[Bipolar disorder] symptoms were scarce during the preschool years and increased throughout [early adolescence],” wrote Boris Birmaher, M.D., of the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine and colleagues. “Developing early interventions to delay or, ideally, prevent [bipolar disorder] onset are warranted.”

Birmaher and colleagues recruited 116 children who had a parent with either bipolar I or II disorder (BD-I/II parents), 53 children of parents with a non-bipolar psychiatric disorder (non-BD parents), and 45 children of parents with no psychiatric disorder (healthy parents) for the study. All children were between the ages of 2 and 5 years at the start of the study and were periodically assessed for about 10 years using the Schedule for Affective Disorders and Schizophrenia for School-Age Children, Present and Lifetime Version (KSADS-PL).

The researchers found that the children of BD-I/II parents were significantly more likely to have ADHD by age 5 (21.6% of children) than children of non-BD parents (3.8%) and children of healthy parents (2.2%). After age 5, children of BD-I/II parents and non-BD parents showed no statistical difference in rates of non-bipolar psychiatric disorders. However, compared with children of healthy parents, children of BD-I/II parents had elevated rates of anxiety, ADHD, and behavior problems after age 5.

During the study period, 17 of the children of parents with BD-I/II (about 15%) were diagnosed with bipolar disorder; four children developed BD-I/II and 13 developed BD-Not-Otherwise-Specified (BD-NOS), with an average age of onset of 11.4 and 7.4 years, respectively. (BD-NOS is typically diagnosed in people who show bipolar mood swings but the timing and/or intensity do not meet the full criteria of BD-I or BD-II.) None of the children in the other groups received a diagnosis of bipolar disorder during the study.

“Given that youth with BD-NOS exhibit as much psychosocial impairment, suicide risk, substance abuse, comorbid disorders, and family history of BD as youths with BD-I/II, and are at very high risk to transition into BD-I/II (particularly if they have family history of BD), the diagnosis of BD-NOS warrants significant clinical consideration,” Birmaher and colleagues wrote.

The researchers looked over the data to see which factors might help predict the youth who would develop bipolar disorder; the only significant risk factors they identified were an ADHD diagnosis before age 6 and having parents with early onset bipolar disorder.

To read more on this topic, see the *Psychiatric News* article “[Study Sheds Light on Trajectory of Developing Bipolar Disorder](https://psychnews.psychiatryonline.org/doi/10.1176/appi.pn.2019.2a11).”

 (Image: iStock/shapecharge)

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## [Study Identifies Some Predictors of Bipolar Disorder in At-Risk Youth](https://alert.psychnews.org/2018/12/study-identifies-some-predictors-of.html)

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## [Bipolar Disorder Risk Factors Identified in Children of Parents With the Disorder](https://alert.psychnews.org/2015/03/bipolar-disorder-risk-factors.html)

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While childhood bipolar disorder is not a common diagnosis, a new study shows that symptoms of the...

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