Children with alcohol exposure and children with ADHD were similarly impaired compared to controls on all other neuropsychological measures related to executive functioning (WISC-IV Working Memory and Processing Speed, all D-KEFS and CANTAB subtests). Executive dysfunction represents a hallmark deficit for both children with FASD (Mattson, Crocker, et al., 2011) and non-exposed children with ADHD (Barkley, 1997; Nigg, 2005). The similar deficits demonstrated by the clinical groups might be a result of a shared core deficit of higher order processing (Mattson, Crocker, et al., 2011). Relative weaknesses in executive functioning in non-exposed children with ADHD may bring them into the range of deficits exhibited by the alcohol-exposed children. In spite of the similar deficits noted in the clinical groups, Mattson, et al. (2013) reported that variables from the CANTAB and D-KEFS could be used to differentiate subjects with prenatal alcohol exposure from ADHD with 73.9% clarification accuracy. Thus, while the within-group variability of executive function performance is sufficient to accurately distinguish these clinical conditions (Mattson, et al., 2013), the current results support the use of other, potentially more sensitive measures
