Keith Conners

{{Short description|American psychologist (1933–2017)}} {{Use mdy dates|date=July 2017}} {{infobox scientist |name=Keith Conners |birth_name=Carmen Keith Conners |birth_date={{birth date|1933|3|20}} |birth_place=Bingham Canyon, Utah, U.S. |death_date={{death date and age|2017|7|5|1933|3|20}} |death_place=Durham, North Carolina, U.S. |education=University of Chicago (BA)<br>University of Oxford (MA)<br>Harvard University (PhD) |occupation=Psychologist |known_for=Establishing the first standards of the diagnosis for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder |fields=Psychology }} '''Carmen Keith Conners''' (March 20, 1933 – July 5, 2017) was an American psychologist, best known for establishing the first standards for the diagnosis of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).

Conners was born on March 20, 1933, in Bingham Canyon, Utah, one of three children of Michael Conners, a machinist, and Merle Conners, who worked in a department store. He earned degrees from the University of Chicago (BA), University of Oxford (MA), and Harvard University (PhD).<ref name="nytimes1">{{cite web|author=BENEDICT CAREY|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/13/health/keith-conners-dead-psychologist-adhd-diagnosing.html?mcubz=0 |title=Keith Conners, Psychologist Who Set Standard for Diagnosing A.D.H.D., Dies at 84 - The New York Times |work=The New York Times |date=July 13, 2017 |accessdate=July 17, 2017}}</ref>

Conners is credited by many as putting ADHD on the map in the USA and helped develop early assessments for ADHD,<ref name="Frances 2016">{{cite web|url=https://www.huffingtonpost.com/allen-frances/keith-conners-father-of-adhd_b_9558252.html|title=Keith Conners, Father of ADHD, Regrets Its Current Misuse|first=Allen|last=Frances|website=HuffPost |date=March 28, 2016|publisher=}}</ref> including the Conners Comprehensive Behaviour Rating Scale.<ref name="pmid4900822">{{cite journal |vauthors=Conners CK |title=A teacher rating scale for use in drug studies with children |journal=The American Journal of Psychiatry |volume=126 |issue=6 |pages=884–8 |date=December 1969 |pmid=4900822 |doi=10.1176/ajp.126.6.884 |url=}}</ref><ref name="pmid3385082">{{cite journal |vauthors=Cohen M |title=The Revised Conners Parent Rating Scale: factor structure replication with a diversified clinical sample |journal=Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology |volume=16 |issue=2 |pages=187–96 |date=April 1988 |pmid=3385082 |doi=10.1007/BF00913594}}</ref> In later years, he raised concerns about the high rates of diagnosis of ADHD in the United States as compared to Europe, and suggested that ADHD may be diagnosed too frequently in the US.<ref name="Frances 2016"/> He believed the true rates of childhood ADHD were 2-3%.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://medium.com/@IAmJeffEmmerson/a-founding-father-of-the-adhd-diagnosis-wrote-his-own-obituary-to-warn-against-current-c54d2459e620|title=A founding father of the ADHD diagnosis wrote his own obituary to warn against current...|first=Jeff|last=Emmerson|date=July 8, 2017|publisher=|access-date=September 9, 2018|archive-date=June 27, 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180627230806/https://medium.com/@IAmJeffEmmerson/a-founding-father-of-the-adhd-diagnosis-wrote-his-own-obituary-to-warn-against-current-c54d2459e620|url-status=dead}}</ref>

Conners died on July 5, 2017, in Durham, North Carolina, aged 84.<ref name="nytimes1"/>

==References== {{Reflist}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Conners, Keith}} Category:1933 births Category:2017 deaths Category:People from Bingham Canyon, Utah Category:People from Durham, North Carolina Category:20th-century American psychologists Category:University of Chicago alumni Category:Alumni of the University of Oxford Category:Harvard Graduate School of Arts and Sciences alumni Category:21st-century American psychologists Category:Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder researchers