comment: >
  
  I have ADHD and even without the distraction of screens, trying to concentrate without medication is so hard. Back in the 1980s when there was little awareness of ADHD I imagined so many people struggled silently, like I did before I got diagnosed. Also I think whether ADHD is a disability depends on how much harm it does to the individual and those around them. For me, ADHD got in the way of my academic achievement which was something important to me. But medication brought me up on an even playing field with everyone else and I'm now at University which is what I wanted to achieve.
context: The problem with this analysis is that it doesn't engage with a theory of causality. Just because society is involved in the definition of "disability" or in the categorization of things as disabilities, doesn't mean that those disabilities are caused by society.
  By analogy, which things are called "blue" is determined by society. That doesn't mean that the sky being blue is caused by society. >
  
  Society defines what a mental disability is, therefore if you meet that definition then you are considered mentally disabled. However, the extent that societies definition CAUSES your disability is limited to that of a label, there is no physical manifestation of that.
  Psychologists look at the broad range of human behavior and defines what is typical, if you fall outside that typical range then they have conjured up some labels to help categorize.
  So, human behaviors never changed, it's just that we have built complex ways of sorting them.
  I suspect the same is true of physical disability. >
  
  I think you are conflating a kind of moral stance with semantics.
  If the social model makes certain things disabilities by society's expectations then you are arguing that means society creates all disabilities. But this means that if a woman was walking down the street and had acid thrown in her face, damaging her eyes to the point of not being able to see, you are saying that society made her disabled. The person who threw the acid blinded her but society made her disabled by expecting people to be able to see and labeling blindness a disability.
  That can be an internally consistent way of talking about it but it isn't what most people mean when they read or say that phrasing, and I don't know how useful that terminology is. In the case of rolling the tongue sure, it is only an issue because society expects it from people. But there are some capabilities that are intrinsic to being a human, independent of social expectations. If you are a quadraplegic you have a lack of ability which is important regardless of what society expects from the common man.
  Similarly if you can't concentrate to the point of being incapable of basic daily tasks then regardless of society labeling it a disability the problem exists, and society didn't create it. You might as well say that the English language is responsible for all disabilities because without the word they wouldn't be "disabled". >
  
  
  if you can't concentrate to the point of being incapable of basic daily tasks
  
  The problem, even with your definition, is that society determines what constitutes a “basic daily task.” Concentrating on schoolwork while a smartphone exists in your pocket is now considered a basic daily task for most students. Even 20 years ago, that wasn’t a basic daily task.
  If you could go back in time and give a classroom of 1990s students smartphones and tell them “you still need to pay attention or else you have a disability. This is now one of your basic daily tasks,” I think you’d immediately see an increase in ADHD. They didn’t have ADHD prior to that. They had the full ability to focus on their basic daily tasks as defined in the 1990s.
  
  it isn't what most people mean when they read or say that phrasing
  
  Certainly if someone’s body changed and society’s expectations of sight remained constant, I think you’d be hard pressed to find someone who claims society’s expectations caused the disability.
  But what I think happened with ADHD is the reverse of that. Brains stayed the same, and society’s expectations of the base level of entertaining distractions changed. In that case, I think you do see people talking this way. People say things like “all these smart phones are giving kids ADHD.” My position is that maybe that’s not a crazy way of looking at it. >
  
  I have ADHD. Something that people don't understand about ADHD, especially people who don't want to think it's real, is how all-encompassing it is. They see it as a set of negative personality traits correlated to brain differences, and basically think that the diagnosis is the pathologization of normal variations between humans.
  What they don't see is that each and every day is a constant struggle of having to compensate for a literal deficit in my brain. For every time I go off on a tangent in a conversation, there are untold multitudes of times that I have to consciously fight against that impulse. It's the same for everything else; I have a persistent, constant feeling that I'm forgetting something, and usually I'm right, but even when I'm not, I have to double, triple check everything I do if it's at all important. I have no intuitive understanding of prioritization or time management, and constantly struggle to balance the importance of a task with how long I have before it becomes immediately pressing.
  I say all of this to show that, fully distinctly from social structures, I would always perceive this as a deficit. There is no social structure that could make me feel like it is good, in any way, because this is something that hampers my ability to achieve my goals, no matter what they are, and harms my personal relationships.
  The reason that previous societies didn't have an ADHD diagnosis has nothing to do with the condition not being a detriment in those societies. It's more that, up until like 50 years ago, when children would act in a way we didn't like, we would hit them with sticks. There weren't even studies on child abuse until the 1970s. This caused people with ADHD to mask more, so that they wouldn't be abused, and is also indicative of how society generally approached problems, especially ones that are not physically visible and are easily taken to be the expression of negative personality traits. If hitting the children with sticks didn't cause them to stop expressing these traits, we just hit them harder, or came up with other cruel, physically painful, but also horribly ineffective methods of punishment (at least in terms of outcomes for the victim). 
  While this sounds dramatic, I'm not actually exaggerating, and if you don't fully understand just how horrible the past is, you should look into it, specifically the historical treatment of women and children, which doesn't get talked about enough in school. I think that it is safe to say that the vast majority of children throughout human history endured a childhood that would today be considered sufficiently abusive for CPS removal, and that this was and still somewhat is part of a cycle of trauma that cannot be meaningfully separated from the social systems of past eras. It was part of how they maintained a society with fundamental, internal contradictions, based on unjustified and incorrect beliefs, that oppressed the vast majority of the population.
  The reason that there is an ADHD diagnosis now is that, for the first time in history, sufficient numbers of people don't think that violence is the answer to actually be a socially dominant force, and as a result, society is willing and able to solve these problems instead of just beating the absolute shit out of anyone violating social norms. >
  
  With the child abuse, you brought up a really interesting possible explanation that I hadn’t thought of, and I think this is the closest I have come to changing my view on this particular issue
  If I could challenge you for a second though, if you look at the statistics of left-handed people over the past century, you see a rise that starts around 1900 and eventually plateaus in the 1960s, from which it has remained relatively constant ever since. The common explanation is that people stopped literally beating children for using their left hand. That was a common practice in the 19th century and earlier, which caused a significant number of people to “mask” by using their right hand.
  My position would be that the people who masked should be considered right-handed. To the extent that left-handedness means something, I don’t think it should be used to describe people who literally use their right hand.
  Would your position be that the people who masked and used their right hand were nonetheless left-handed? Like is that what the term “left-handed” would mean to you? And it’s not necessarily dependent on which hand someone actually ends up using? >
  
  I don’t think modern society is causing ADHD, but rather, exaggerating the effect it does have for the people who already have it. Social media, TikTok, etc, is putting salt in an already nasty wound.
  Short attention spans are a trademark ADHD symptom, but that’s not all it is, and as modern society has certainly shown, you don’t need ADHD to have a short attention span.
  ADHD stems from a genetic imbalance in the core functions of your brain. Attention span is a symptom of that, but so is memory, the ability to process through thoughts, decision making, impulse control, and others. 
  At worse, someone might be able to develop minor symptoms of it, but I don’t think it’s permanent damage to the brain like ADHD (I might be wrong on that). Once the habit is broken, then the effects will eventually be reversed. >
  
  Adhd is not caused by any form of damage, it’s a permanent state. 
  Also, what most people don’t know (in my experience, living with the diagnosis since 12 years back) is that the symptoms themselves are only indicators. Symptoms are overall problematic since it’s based on an outside perspective. Even psychiatrists tend to be surprised when you tell them about what it’s like from your own pov. They learn how to observe and sometimes I wonder how much thought is put into actually understanding as well. >
  
  “Damage” wasn’t the right word for it. You put it better than I could have >
  
  It's obviously an interplay between society and the individual.  If you can't roll your tongue and that's a disability, your disability is both due to your inability and the structure of society.
  
  I posit that the social model of disability indicates that the correct explanation is a lot closer to the first.
  
  It only indicates that's a possibility.  It's an empirical question to what extent society has different demands and to what extent human abilities are changing.  One that hasn't been answered satisfactorily yet. >
  
  You can't extrapolate entire theories of disability from one or two examples because disability is incredibly diverse in manifestation. ADHD is one of the few disorders that is a true spectrum, meaning the "cutoff point" at which symptoms impact daily functioning to qualify as a "disorder" is influenced heavily by culture. 
  Other mental illness and disabilities are not "true spectra" but follow different diagnostic patterns. For instance, psychosis (seeing and hearing things that aren't there) is a binary diagnostic. You either experience psychosis or you don't. There are different levels of severity and typology of presentations, but it does not occur in a "normal curve/distribution" like other human attributes like height or executive functioning. The same is true for genetic disorders. You either have a genetic marker for a specific disorder or you don't, regardless of culture. >
  
  I don't necessarily disagree with everything you said. But having a disability, imo, is more than just about society's expectations. It's also how a disability changes how we function in the world and how it may hinder (or improve) our day-to-day lives and the things we want to do.
  To use your example, ADHD can make communication, focus, timeliness (ect.) more difficult. If it's important to me to be able to pay 100% attention to reading a book for an extended period of time, ADHD will, at least in my case, make it a lot more difficult or even impossible to do this. It hinders what I want to do personally; it "disables" my ability to fulfill that goal.
  Say someone loves to listen to music but for some reason suddenly become deaf. Now this person is effectively unable to pursue a part of their life that was enjoyable/fulfilling to them. On the other hand, if a second person doesn't enjoy listening to music, they may consider their deafness to be less disabling than the first person. That's not exactly a great example, but I hope you get what I'm saying.
  I guess my point is that what we desire to do is often not the same as what society expects of us as people, able-bodied and disabled alike. It's all relative. >
  
  Agree with this. ADHD affects my relationships with others, particularly staying in touch with people, hypersensitivity to ‘rejection’, “out of sight, out of mind’ thinking, etc. 
  I understand what OP is saying and agree with a lot of it, but ADHD may not be the best example. While there are things like punctuality that you could argue is only disordered in relation to the expectation that has been ordered, there are individual-level handicaps I personally experience - it isn’t society’s expectation of me maintaining relationships with family and friends, it’s my own desire to do so and encountering obstacles that I’d characterize as disordered. >
  
  The problem with your theory is that it ignores the actual physiological differences in the people with these issues. Brain structure, Neuro pathways, etc. that lead to neurodiversity are real things not caused by social expectations. You say it yourself, a lot of uneducated people guess without evidence or research at the causes of things all the time. The origins of religion stem from this practice. If you want a theory to hold up, bring some data. >
  
  Modern society does not cause ADHD. ADHD is caused by brain structures and science stuff. Modern society classifies those brain structures and science causes as a disability.
  In a world where society did not classify those brain structures and science stuff as a disability, they would still exist. They would still have an effect on people's lives. >
  
  Before humans were good at making tools, do you know how humans hunted? We were "endurance predators." We'd essentially follow a gazelle for 60 miles, then once it collapsed, we'd pick it up, and bring it back to our family to eat. That's how natural humans got nourishment. Apart from the physical stress, that's far more mind-numbing than staring at an excel file for 8 hours. Now, imagine that an endurance predators human had ADHD. Wouldn't that be a hindrance? >
  
  I have actually thought of how what is now known as ADHD could have manifested itself among primitive people.
  A common meme among those with ADHD is “hey look a squirrel!” Immediately noticing small nearby wildlife is a hindrance to those who are trying to focus on an excel file in modern times. I think, if anything, it would be much more of a benefit to those who are tracking large game many miles. Does that mean they could have had a disorder in other situations? Maybe. But I can see also how what is now considered a disorder would be helpful to a society in the past. They may have been viewed as literally “differently abled” to the extent you can view that term as anything but PC nonsense >
  
  
  They may have been viewed as literally “differently abled” to the extent you can view that term as anything but PC nonsense
  
  Is it PC nonsense though? Consider how what we once called "idiot savants" are now often considered to be people with Asperger's. They've contributed substantially to society but we still consider them "disabled."
  There would certainly be certain primal functions that were seriously inhibited by constantly being burdened with thoughts of, "hey look a squirrel!” And isn't that serious hindrance what a disability is? >
  
  So I think this is a misunderstanding of
  ADHD. I don’t think TikTok or having pines explains everything.
  You also show a good understanding of the social model of disability but the way you are applying it doesn’t seem correct.
  The right way to put it wouldn’t be that social media or screens are causing ADHD (social model is not about the physical condition itself but whether that condition is a hindrance).
  The right way to put it would be that ADHD is now considered a disability in need of treatment because students are required to sit quietly indoors in a classroom.
  If school was setup differently, allowing children to move around, go outside, take their time with tasks, etc, then it maybe wouldn’t matter.
  How much ADHD is being diagnosed I think is irrelevant. It could be that modern technology is causing it. But modern society also causes people to be overweight. Whether that is considered a disability is still down to how you define “disability” either using the social or medical model. >
  
  I’m going to challenge your view that ADHD would not impact an individuals ability to function prior to modern society.  ADHD caused issues well before home computers and smart phones were a thing. The inability to focus on rote learning and memorization has been a disability as long as schools have taught with those methods.  Anyone with ADHD is at a severe disadvantage in any situation where they are judged by their ability in those tasks and that has been around for centuries. >
  
  Clarification questions:
  
  From your arguments, this seems to generalise to all disabilities (physical or psychological), was this intended? I.e. all disabilities are caused by society because society defines what disabilities are?
  Is your argument that 1. modern society is the sole cause of ADHD? 
  
  Counters:
  Society defines the scales that measure (dis)ability. The scales shift over time as societal conditions change. For instance, below average literacy (reading/writing) will be much higher than it was 1000 years ago. The causes of low literacy over time are likely biological and social, with the social side causing the most variation in the average. In other words, poor people used to not have access to books nor education to make them literate, but, sometimes, someone is born who will never be able to read.
  On the ADHD case, the symptoms of ADHD may have a number of societal causes (e.g. shorter attention spans due to social media, internet, etc.), however there will be biological causes also, that vary less over time. >
  
  
  I think that there are probably some physical and mental states that are inconsistent with fully functioning in ANY society. As in, no realistic society could accommodate those who suffer from it. But yes it would apply to both physical and mental disabilities.
  
  I do want to be clear that I’m not saying simply that society defines what disabilities are (at least not in the most straightforward literal sense that the DSM used to consider homosexuality a mental illness). My position would be that homosexuality was NEVER a disability, regardless of what the DSM said. Instead, I’m saying that society sets its expectations of what body states and mental states are necessary to function, and then disabilities exist because of those expectations.
  
  My position is that society is a but-for cause of ADHD existing in over 10% of the student population. In a more accommodating society with less distractions, some people who now have ADHD would literally not have attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder. Of course their own brain determines whether each individual has ADHD or not.
  
  But that’s what my tongue-rolling analogy was about. In a world with the straw-less cups that have a tongue hole, some people might be diagnosed as having “perpetually flat tongue disorder.” Those people do not presently have PFTD. In the world with straw-less cups, a person’s genetics would determine whether each individual has PFTD or not. But societies’ demands would be the cause of it even being a disability in the first place. >
  
  Thanks for clarifying, I think I have a better idea of your arguments. I think my main issue is still with the statements around causality. As you state, PTFD is caused by genetics but defined by society as a disability. These should be considered distinct. 
  As you say, society can define a phenomena as a disability (PTFD, homosexuality) regardless of whether it should be defined as such. The cause of these phenomena can be societal, biological, cultural, etc. but the definition is always societal/cultural. I think it would be more accurate to state that modern society defines ADHD (rather than causes). Society is the cause of people being diagnosed with ADHD, but ADHD itself is caused by many factors. Same in the PTFD scenario, the cause of PTFD is genetic but the definition of PTFD is what makes it a disability. 
  The social model of disability illustrates why the term "disability" is problematic. It defines a phenomena (ADHD) as a disability, rather than a set of symptoms/behaviours that have causes and effects. The term "attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder" is in itself a list of all the negative symptoms experienced by people belonging to the group we term ADHD. We could have called it high energy  hyper focus behavioural traits (all common features of the ADHD population) instead, reframing it as something other than a disability. Regardless of the definition's framing, though, the causes of the behaviours are the same. >
  
  Some ADHD symptoms only exist in the context of our world as it is currently designed. If there were no time limits on tests, for example, students with ADHD wouldn’t be disadvantaged relative to their peers who can work faster. In other cases, ADHD just makes it hard to do basic tasks, and I can’t think of a version of our society were adults aren’t required to do some kind of tasks, either for work or for self care. >
  
  I think the simplest way to change your view might be this: define the word itself. 
  It is simply an impaired function of some kind. 
  Society will adapt its understanding of biology over time. The new lens will provide more accurate diagnoses. It will make certain things more easy to notice. 
  But it doesn't alter the impairment. 
  Your argument is about classification, not disability. >
  
  I don’t want to belabor the rolling tongues analogy, but I do think it’s instructive.
  Some people cannot roll their tongues. That’s not up for debate. It’s an impaired function of some kind, if you will. They literally cannot move their muscles in that way.
  What does not follow is that an inability to roll tongues is a disability. The word disability does not simply mean inability.
  It’s not a disability. And that’s not because researchers haven’t studied rolled tongues enough. It’s not because they don’t understand all the biological factors that go into it. It’s not a disability because no major function in society is easier with a rolled tongue. >
  
  It would be a disability if it was common to the human species. Our view of its necessity makes no difference. 
  "Instructive" does not allow you to bypass your general premise. It is instructive to consider what would happen if gravity was reversed. It exercises the mind. But it has no practical application. >
  
  I would argue that those two models really aren't different at all. 
  
  a machine to be fixed to conform with certain normative bodily functions
  
  Who decides what is a "normative bodily function"? It can't possibly be anything other than "society". 
  Even those which are a matter of bare survival, such as "inability to digest food" or "inability to feel pain" are normative only because humans in society think survival is a good thing. 
  One of your reductio ad absurdum examples is "inability to roll your tongue"... but... around 70% of people can do this, so by any reasonable definition those who can't aren't "normal" at least to some degree. 
  Even if we assume survival is some kind of objectively normative thing (evolution will tend to select that out all else being equal): Inability to perform needed and normal functions within a society is basically everything else.
  Of course not being able to do those things are disabilities. But that inability is not created by society needing you to do that thing... the inability was there regardless... all that changed is whether that inability is significant enough to cause you problems.
  Society inventing writing didn't make dyslexia an inability/disfunction... it always was one. It just make it really important. >
  
  
  Who decides what is a "normative bodily function"? It can't possibly be anything other than "society".
  
  There are people who believe that humans being bipedal, for example, is not a social construct. They think it’s built into the designation of human. The fact that humans have 46 chromosomes is not a social construct to them. So to them, someone with one leg or with 47 chromosomes has a disability. Their body deviates from the standard human. I don’t necessarily agree with that, but I can see the argument that they are making.
  To put it in another context, they believe they would be able to identify that a deaf dog, for example, is disabled. They’re not relying on any interpretation of “dog society” to make that declaration. >
  
  Right, but by that kind of definition: a brain being outside of the  human norm of being able to pay attention would also be a disability if being outside the norm of a human capability is what defines a "disability". Or being left-handed for that matter.
  It's certainly a social construct to decide which of those is important, but that doesn't "create" the disability, it just changes the importance. >
  
  You’re sort of preaching to the choir here, because I subscribe fully to the social model. Blindness does not exist as a disability somewhere out there in the ether. It (as opposed to the inability to roll tongues, for example) only exists as a disability because society does not accommodate blind people. Society fully accommodates those who cannot roll their tongues, which is the ONLY reason it is not a disability. In a different society, it would be a disability.
  Take my word for it that there are people who do not subscribe to that view. They would never view the inability to roll tongues as a disability. >
  
  i get where you're going with this, but i think you might be a bit off the mark with the adhd. it's so much more than a short attention span or an unwillingness to concentrate on something boring, some things which are made apparent by modern society and some which would be disabling no matter what.
  i think it is okay to accept that disabilities are defined by the societal norm, because the societal norm is defined by the majority of the human gene pool, which in nature is the gene pool with the best chance of surviving. not that adhd doesn't have its survival benefits, but it certainly has some major drawbacks (this is coming from someone with adhd). 
  i prefer to think of the disability as existing no matter what (defining a disability as a deviance from the genetic norm that is not exclusively or definitely beneficial) and then being made apparent by society. 
  if someone who has adhd is born into a village full of people with adhd, they are not going to be observed as having a disability because they are not a deviation. however, a person with adhd born into a village full of non-adhd people will be observed as having a disability because they deviate from the genetic norm. the disability, or in a better word, trait, exists no matter what, but it becomes defined as a disability when it shows a negative deviance from the social norm. having a society that bases norms off genetic majorities is a pretty natural thing, although it is also needed to move towards being more accepting and accommodating of deviations, or disabilities. pretty much what op was saying, just a bit more nuanced of a theory i think >
  
  a clearer way to express this, though it's just semantics,  is by identifying everything society considers a "disability" a genetic "trait." now, the trait of being tall is similar to the trait of being blind. in our society, being tall is not considered a disability, though it might be in a society designed for short people with everything down low. similarly, being blind is considered a disability because our society is designed for sight. a trait does not become a disability until it occurs in an unaccommodating society, even though the trait always exists. similarly to how english is considered a foreign language in germany, but not in america. it exists as the same language, but it's label changes based on society. 
  of course that didn't account for caused disabilities, like losing a leg, as compared to genetic disabilities, but i think it still stands.