Components and Developmental Differences of Executive Functioning for School-Aged Children

Wu, Kitty K.; Chan, Sumee K; Leung, Patrick; Liu, Wai-sum; Leung, Flora L. T.; Ng, Ren

doi:10.1080/87565641.2010.549979

Cited by 80 publications

(74 citation statements)

References 37 publications

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“…The school-age period was targeted for two reasons. First, the three EF components that were the focus of the present study have been confirmed in school-age children (Duan et al, 2010;Rose et al, 2011;Wu et al, 2011). In younger children, there was a possibility of finding a more integrated EF system (e.g., Wiebe, Espy, & Charak, 2008).…”

Section: The Current Studysupporting

confidence: 66%

The Relationship Between Executive Functions and Language Abilities in Children: A Latent Variables Approach

Kaushanskaya

Park

Gangopadhyay

et al. 2017

J Speech Lang Hear Res

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Purpose: We aimed to outline the latent variables approach for measuring nonverbal executive function (EF) skills in school-age children, and to examine the relationship between nonverbal EF skills and language performance in this age group. Method: Seventy-one typically developing children, ages 8 through 11, participated in the study. Three EF components, inhibition, updating, and task-shifting, were each indexed using 2 nonverbal tasks. A latent variables approach was used to extract latent scores that represented each EF construct. Children were also administered common standardized language measures. Multiple regression analyses were conducted to examine the relationship between EF and language skills.Results: Nonverbal updating was associated with the Receptive Language Index on the Clinical Evaluation of Language Fundamentals-Fourth Edition (CELF-4). When composites denoting lexical-semantic and syntactic abilities were derived, nonverbal inhibition (but not shifting or updating) was found to predict children's syntactic abilities. These relationships held when the effects of age, IQ, and socioeconomic status were controlled. Conclusions: The study makes a methodological contribution by explicating a method by which researchers can use the latent variables approach when measuring EF performance in school-age children. The study makes a theoretical and a clinical contribution by suggesting that language performance may be related to domain-general EFs. E xecutive functions (EFs) are a set of top-down cognitive control processes used to manage thought and behavior (Diamond, 2013;Miyake et al., 2000). EFs are crucial to the ability to adapt efficiently to changes in the environment (Huizinga, Dolan, & van der Molen, 2006;Zelazo, Müller, Frye, & Marcovitch, 2003), and to the ability to manage basic daily tasks, such as planning, decision making, and problem solving (Friedman et al., 2006;Miyake et al., 2000). It is not surprising then that there is a wealth of literature linking EFs and broad quality-of-life outcomes, including academic achievement (e.g., Best, Miller, & Naglieri, 2011;Blair & Razza, 2007) and social-emotional development (Broidy et al., 2003;Ferrier, Bassett, & Denham, 2014) There is a great deal of interest in accurately measuring EF skills in our field, both for the purposes of documenting EF deficits in impaired populations and for the purposes of possibly influencing language outcomes through targeting EF skills. In the present study, we examined EF performance in a sample of monolingual typically developing children, with the following three goals. The first goal was a methodological one: We aimed to document the use of a latent variables approach when measuring nonverbal EF performance in children. The second goal was a clinical one: We aimed to examine whether children's performance on common standardized language measures is associated with EFs. The third goal was a theoretical one: We aimed to examine whether domain-general EF skills (as indexed by performance on nonverbal EF tasks)...

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Section: The Current Studysupporting

confidence: 66%

The Relationship Between Executive Functions and Language Abilities in Children: A Latent Variables Approach

Kaushanskaya

Park

Gangopadhyay

et al. 2017

J Speech Lang Hear Res

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“…With regard to the first goal of our study-to test a model of EF comprised of a sequential flow of cognitive processes-the exploratory factor analysis conducted on the neuropsychological measures of the EF battery identified five latent dimensions of neurocognitive functioning that support a unified model of EF in children: Inhibition, Planning, Execution, and Memory of Performance, sustained by Speed of Processing. In fact, our data support a "sequential" EF model, wherein EF could represent consecutive cognitive processes (see, for example, Burgess et al, 2000;Zelazo & Frye, 1998) rather than other neurocognitive models that have proposed a division of EF into distinct and fractionated domains (see, for example, Letho et al, 2003;Wu et al, 2011). More specifically, the present results are consistent with the "ecological" EF model proposed by Burgess et al (2000).…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 91%

An Integrated Model of Executive Functioning is Helpful for Understanding ADHD and Associated Disorders

et al. 2014

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“…Executive functions have at least three components (inhibition, shifting, and updating; see Miyake et al, 2000;Wu et al, 2011), but on higher levels, other components are also known to exist, such as planning, self regulation, monitoring, and strategy using (Zelazo & Müller, 2002). The inference to be drawn from meta-analyses is that the executive profiles of ADHD have a large heterogeneity (Sergeant, Geurts, & Oosterlaan, 2002;Willcutt, et al, 2005).…”

Section: Executive Functions In Adhdmentioning

confidence: 99%

Verbal fluency in children with ADHD: Strategy using and temporal properties

Takács

Kóbor

Tárnok

et al. 2013

Child Neuropsychology

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Verbal fluency tasks are commonly used in cognitive and developmental neuropsychology in assessing executive functions, language skills as well as divergent thinking. 22 typically developing children and 22 children with ADHD between the ages of 8 and12 years were examined using verbal fluency tasks, prepotent response inhibition and working memory tests. The clinical group showed impaired inhibitory and spatial working memory processes.We used different qualitative analyses of verbal fluency tasks to explore the lexical and executive strategies (word clustering and switching), and the temporal properties of the responses. Children with ADHD had a leeway in applying relevant lexical or executive strategies related to difficulties in strategy using. The reduced efficiency of children with ADHD in semantic fluency task is based on suboptimal shifting between word clusters, and related to the lack of ability of producing new clusters of items. The group difference appeared at the level of accessing and/or activating common words; however the executive process of searching the lexicon extensively is intact.

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Components and Developmental Differences of Executive Functioning for School-Aged Children

Cited by 80 publications

References 37 publications

The Relationship Between Executive Functions and Language Abilities in Children: A Latent Variables Approach

The Relationship Between Executive Functions and Language Abilities in Children: A Latent Variables Approach

An Integrated Model of Executive Functioning is Helpful for Understanding ADHD and Associated Disorders

Verbal fluency in children with ADHD: Strategy using and temporal properties

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