Abstract
It has been conjectured that basic individual differences in attentional control influence higher-level executive functioning and subsequent academic performance in children. The current study sets out to complement the limited body of research on early precursors of executive functions (EFs). It provides both a cross-sectional, as well as a longitudinal exploration of the relationship between EF and more basic attentional control mechanisms, assessed via children's performance on memory storage tasks, and influenced by individual differences in anxiety. Multiple measures of verbal and visuospatial short-term memory (STM) were administered to children between 3 and 6 years old, alongside a non-verbal measure of intelligence, and a parental report of anxiety symptoms. After 9 months, children were re-tested on the same STM measures, at which time we also administered multiple measures of executive functioning: verbal and visuospatial working memory (WM), inhibition, and shifting. A cross-sectional view of STM development indicated that between 3 and 6 years the trajectory of visuospatial STM and EF underwent a gradual linear improvement. However, between 5 and 6 years progress in verbal STM performance stagnated. Hierarchical regression models revealed that trait anxiety was negatively associated with WM and shifting, while non-verbal intelligence was positively related to WM span. When age, gender, non-verbal intelligence, and anxiety were controlled for, STM (measured at the first assessment) was a very good predictor of overall executive performance. The models were most successful in predicting WM, followed by shifting, yet poorly predicted inhibition measures. Further longitudinal research is needed to directly address the contribution of attentional control mechanisms to emerging executive functioning and to the development of problematic behavior during early development.
Highlights
During the past decades, the importance of investigating the early development of executive functions (EFs) has been reinforced by a growing body of evidence linking preschool EFs measures to emerging academic success, to social competence during early school years (Ciairano et al, 2007; Razza and Blair, 2009), and to internalizing and externalizing symptoms (Thorell and Wåhlstedt, 2006; Brocki et al, 2010; Hughes and Ensor, 2011)
In order to determine whether performance on short-term memory (STM) tasks was associated with children’s EF performance 9 months later, beyond other first assessment measures, separate hierarchical regressions were carried out for each EF outcome
We further tested whether concurrent levels of STM were useful in the prediction of EF outcomes beyond the first assessment STM, age, gender, non-verbal intelligence, and anxiety
Summary
The importance of investigating the early development of executive functions (EFs) has been reinforced by a growing body of evidence linking preschool EFs measures to emerging academic success (see Willoughby et al, 2012a, for a recent review), to social competence during early school years (Ciairano et al, 2007; Razza and Blair, 2009), and to internalizing and externalizing symptoms (Thorell and Wåhlstedt, 2006; Brocki et al, 2010; Hughes and Ensor, 2011) This endeavor was previously constrained by the limited methodological repertoire allowing researchers to track EF progress across successive developmental periods. Further longitudinal studies complementing the limited existing literature (e.g., Riggs et al, 2004; Hughes and Ensor, 2011; Tillman et al, 2013) are necessary www.frontiersin.org
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