Executive function deficits in children born preterm or at low birthweight: a meta‐analysis

Abstract

AimTo investigate the magnitude of executive function deficits and their dependency on gestational age, sex, age at assessment, and year of birth for children born preterm and/or at low birthweight.MethodPubMed, PsychINFO, Web of Science, and ERIC were searched for studies reporting on executive functions in children born preterm/low birthweight and term controls born in 1990 and later, assessed at a mean age of 4 years or higher. Studies were included if five or more studies reported on the same executive function measures.ResultsThirty‐five studies (3360 children born preterm/low birthweight, 2812 controls) were included. Children born preterm/low birthweight performed 0.5 standardized mean difference (SMD) lower on working memory and cognitive flexibility and 0.4 SMD lower on inhibition. SMDs for these executive functions did not significantly differ from each other. Meta‐regression showed that heterogeneity in SMDs for working memory and inhibition could not be explained by study differences in gestational age, sex, age at assessment, or year of birth.InterpretationChildren born preterm/low birthweight since 1990 perform half a SMD below term‐born peers on executive function, which does not seem to improve with more recent advances in medical care or with increasing age.What this paper adds Children born preterm/low birthweight perform below term‐born children on core executive functions.Lower gestational age or male sex are not risk factors for poorer executive functions.Executive function difficulties in children born preterm/low birthweight remain stable across childhood.Executive function difficulties are similar for children born recently and children born in earlier eras.

Longitudinal Relationships Between Reading Abilities, Phonological Awareness, Language Abilities and Executive Functions: Comparison of Low Risk Preterm and Full-Term Children

“…Again, GA does not seem to be the main cause of this difference. These results contrast with those obtained by other studies carried out with VPT and EPT children (Alanko et al, 2017;Leijon et al, 2018;van Houdt et al, 2019), which showed clear deficits in relation to FT children in several EFs; these results support those found by Pérez-Pereira et al (2019) with healthy PT children.…”

Altered brain metabolism contributes to executive function deficits in school-aged children born very preterm

“…Very preterm birth is a risk factor for long-term neurodevelopmental sequelae. 1 , 2 Among the abilities most frequently impaired are executive functions, 3 , 4 a set of higher-order and inter-related cognitive skills, responsible for adaptive and goal-directed behavior. 5 , 6 Executive function deficits in children and adolescents born preterm have been linked to persisting structural brain alterations evident on MRI, such as white matter abnormalities and smaller volumes in subcortical structures including the caudate and thalamus.…”

Intervenção precoce no desenvolvimento neuromotor de lactentes prematuros de risco

“…O destaque dado ao nascimento prematuro diz respeito não apenas à idade gestacional do bebê, mas ao peso ao nascimento e os fatores de risco decorrentes da imaturidade funcional e estrutural do organismo do pré-termo 16 . Van Houdt et al 18 verificaram através de uma revisão sistemática de outros estudos que bebês prematuros de baixo peso ao nascimento para idade gestacional, apresentam probabilidade maior de desenvolver dificuldades em tarefas executivas do que bebês prematuros com peso adequado para idade gestacional.…”