Near- and far-transfer effects of an executive function intervention for 2nd to 5th-grade struggling readers

Abstract

This study assessed the impact of a teacher-delivered, small-group reading-specific executive function (EF) intervention on reading performance in a sample of 57 teacher-identified struggling readers, ranging in age from 7;6 to 12;3 (Mage = 9;10) in 2nd to 5th grades at a public elementary school in the Mid-Atlantic United States. Near-transfer effects of EF interventions are more common than far-transfer to academic skills. Thus, we assessed near- and far-transfer effects for intervention (n = 29) and control (n = 28) children. The reading-specific EF intervention produced medium to large effects on reading-specific and domain-general EF skills as well as on researcher-administered and school-administered reading comprehension measures, even after grade level (and thus reading teacher), verbal ability, children’s age, and respective pretest scores were controlled. These findings underscore the importance of translational work that takes researcher-tested interventions into real-world contexts to support children’s development. Implications of findings for practice are discussed.