The Predictive Impact of Biological and Sociocultural Factors on Executive Processing: The Role of Age, Education, and Frequency of Reading and Writing Habits

Abstract

Although the impact of education and age on executive functions (EF) has been widely studied, the influence of daily cognitive stimulation on EF has not been sufficiently investigated. Therefore, the aim of the present study was to evaluate whether the age, education, and frequency of reading and writing habits (FRWH) of healthy adults could predict their performance on measures of inhibition and cognitive flexibility. Inhibition speed, inhibitory control, and set shifting were assessed using speed, accuracy, and discrepancy scores on the Trail-Making Test (TMT) and Hayling Test. Demographic characteristics and the FRWH were assessed using specialized questionnaires. Regression analyses showed that age and the FRWH predicted speed and accuracy on the TMT. The FRWH predicted both speed and accuracy on the Hayling Test, for which speed and accuracy scores were also partly explained by age and education, respectively. Surprisingly, only the FRWH was associated with Hayling Test discrepancy scores, considered one of the purest EF measures. This highlights the importance of regular cognitive stimulation over the number of years of formal education on EF tasks. Further studies are required to investigate the role of the FRWH so as to better comprehend its relationship with EF and general cognition.

Verbal fluency in Alzheimer’s disease and mild cognitive impairment in individuals with low educational level and its relationship with reading and writing habits

“…Likewise, Cotrena et al 20 also highlighted the influence of daily cognitive stimulation, as that provided by FRWH, on executive processing. Conversely, Moraes et al 21 specifically investigated the influence of age, education, and FRWH on semantic, phonemic, and unconstrained VF tasks and found that education was the most influential variable in all VF scores in healthy aging, while FRWH specifically had a greater effect on PF. A recent investigation also found that FRWH predicted the performance of all fluency tasks in a sample similar to the one in this study.…”

Performance Habits: A Framework Proposal

“…So far, the main themes in habit research in human focuses on the formation of health habits (Lally and Gardner, 2013;Gardner, 2015), which is of course of utmost individual and societal importance. Habit research in the field of human performance however is sparse-with some exceptions regarding academic, cognitive, and athletic performance (Cotrena et al, 2016;Dubuc et al, 2019;Longo et al, 2019;Fiorella, 2020;Kristo et al, 2020)and we aim in this opinion piece to outline a range of dimensions which could benefit from the conceptualization of habits for optimizing performance.…”

La competencia comunicativa en estudiantes de los grados de Maestro: Una revisión sistemática

“…Del mismo modo, el desarrollo de habilidades comunicativas favorece el clima del aula, diseñando y gestionando fórmulas alternativas que inciden directamente en su desempeño profesional docente, así como en el desarrollo de sus competencias (Monarca & Rappoport, 2013). También es oportuno indicar la importancia que adquiere el lenguaje escrito en el desarrollo de las capacidades de carácter cognitivo o en la comprensión de conceptos, aspectos claves para el desarrollo de competencias (Cotrena, Branco, Cardoso, Wong, & Fonseca, 2015).…”