In contemporary China, Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) has become increasingly visible among adult women, particularly on digital platforms. Rather than viewing ADHD as a fixed biomedical diagnosis originating in Western psychiatry, this paper argues that ADHD functions as a form of situated knowledge that some Chinese women strategically mobilize to negotiate gendered discipline in everyday life.

Drawing on feminist theories of situated knowledge and everyday practices, the paper situates women’s ADHD narratives within a longer cultural history of regulating female difference. Prior to psychiatric diagnosis, women who were emotionally intense, distracted, or resistant were morally evaluated through Confucian ideals of self-discipline, obedience, or domestic responsibility. These normative expectations did not disappear with the introduction of psychiatric discourse but were reorganized within China’s hybrid medical landscape, where Western psychiatry coexists with Traditional Chinese Medicine. Medicalized knowledge thus reframes gendered responsibilities, particularly those related to motherhood, productivity, and care labor, as matters of self-management.

Based on discourse analysis of women’s narratives on Chinese digital platforms, primarily the Xiaohongshu app, this study shows how some Chinese women appropriate ADHD as a culturally legible language to reframe self-blame, negotiate marital and familial hierarchies, and articulate pressures shaped by meritocratic and gendered expectations. These practices operate as fragile tactical negotiations embedded in everyday life and platform logics.

By grounding ADHD in Chinese cultural histories, medical pluralism, and digital ecologies, this paper demonstrates how global psychiatric labels are culturally localized and tactically repurposed through gendered everyday practices.

Authors:
Chen Chen, Chiang Mai University, Thailand

About the Presenter(s)
Chen Chen is a PhD candidate in cultural studies at Chiang Mai University. Her research focuses on gender, mental health discourse, and digital culture in China, with a project on women’s engagement with ADHD-related knowledge.

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