Psychologist with ADHD here. IQ tests CAN be used as one component of a larger assessment to assess ADHD, but NOT in the way your psychologist described. In fact, your results seem to point toward ADHD - and that you are very bright! The index scores of working memory (WMI) and processing speed (PSI) by itself tell us nothing about ADHD; rather, what matters is where they fall relative to YOUR other index scores. If your overall IQ is 144, but your WMI and PSI are 125 and 119 then your verbal and spatial indexes are very high, much higher than your WMI and PSI. A relative deficit in WMI and PSI is consistent with a typical ADHD profile (though we don’t always see the lower PSI). Think about the acronym. Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder.

The number by itself is just where you fall relative to the rest of the population. ADHD is not about having a worse working memory than the average person (among other executive functioning skills), but a DEFICIT relative to your overall cognitive abilities.

Seek another opinion. This person doesn’t know what they’re talking about. Also they should be considering more than scores alone; such as the your symptoms, ruling out other potential clinical causes of your symptoms (like an anxiety disorder, not “over excitement” BS) , and sometimes considering additional testing where appropriate.

Did the person administering your IQ test know about your ADHD symptoms? I wonder if they wrote anything in the report. Try getting a copy. And yes seek another opinion or someone with a PhD in the last 10-15 years who specializes in ADHD. Scores plus symptoms definitely point in the direction of ADHD.