Identifying unique components of preschool children's self-regulatory skills using executive function tasks and continuous performance tests
Section snippets
Self-regulatory processes
Executive functioning (EF) is an important part of self-regulatory behavior that refers to the control of thoughts and action needed for future-oriented and goal-directed behaviors (Welsh, Pennington, & Groisser, 1991). A variety of theories have been proposed as explanations of the cognitive mechanism that underlies complex tasks requiring intentional allocation of attention resources (i.e. “frontal lobe or executive tasks” Miyake et al., 2000, p. 50). Most such theories propose the existence
The CPT
The overlap between definitions and descriptions of IC, WM, and attention makes determining the extent to which each is uniquely measured by performance on a given task difficult. This is particularly true of multi-faceted tasks such as the CPT, which is widely accepted as a measure of attention and also has been used as a measure of IC (Berry, 2012, Bodnar et al., 2007). During this task, children view a stimulus sequence on a screen, respond to target stimuli, and withhold responses to
Self-regulatory processes, early academic skills, and problem behaviors
There is evidence that attention problems are associated with academic development in research with school-age (McClelland, Acock, & Morrison, 2006) and preschool-age (Walcott, Scheemaker, & Bielski, 2010) populations. Much of the research linking inattention to academic skills has been conducted using teacher and parent ratings of inattention (Galéra et al., 2009, Lonigan et al., 1999). There is also research reporting relations between performance on direct measures of inattention, such as
The current study
The purpose of this study was two-fold. First, the extent to which young children's performance on measures of IC, WM, and the CPT represent distinct or overlapping constructs was examined. CFA was used, rather than the exploratory factor analytic techniques used in previous studies on this topic (Steele et al., 2012, Sulik et al., 2010). In CFA measurement models, at least three observed indicator variables are recommended per latent construct. We conducted analyses using three indicators of
Participants
The sample included 279 children (53.4% female) recruited from 20 preschools and child-care centers serving a diverse population of children in north Florida (e.g., eight of the preschools were located in neighborhoods served by Title-1-classified elementary schools [schools classified as having a large concentration of low-income students]). The children ranged in age from 38 to 65 months (M = 55.86, SD = 4.00). The sample was ethnically diverse; it was composed of 30.5% African-American/Black,
Descriptive statistics
Descriptive statistics for all variables are presented in Table 1. IC and WM task scores are presented as the mean, averaged across trials of the task. Omission errors and commission errors, as well as externalizing behavior scores and academic subscale scores, are presented as the mean across trials or items. Item-level data were aggregated to create scale scores for the IC tasks, WM tasks, externalizing behavior scales, and academic skills measures. Children were allowed to have up to 10%
Discussion
The primary goal of this study was to examine the extent to which measures of performance on the CPT overlap with direct measures of EF skills (i.e., WM and IC). Results indicated that both attention and H/I, as measured by omission and commission errors, respectively, on the CPT, were distinct from EF and each other. This finding implies that low target-frequency CPTs may provide an index of attention that is distinct from, albeit moderately related to, EF in preschool-age children. Both EF
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2022, Journal of Experimental Child PsychologyCitation Excerpt :IC represents the ability to suppress or override a predisposed response, and SH represents the ability to alternate between sets of stimulus–response rules. In contrast, factor analysis with preschool children provides evidence for either a one-dimensional (e.g., Allan et al., 2015; Sims, Purpura, & Lonigan, 2016) or two-dimensional (i.e., IC and WM) (Lerner & Lonigan, 2014; Lonigan, Lerner, Goodrich, Farrington, & Allan, 2016) model of EF. Both attention and EF are associated with academic achievement concurrently and longitudinally.
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2018, Early Childhood Research QuarterlyCitation Excerpt :The construct of self-regulation is broadly defined as consisting of multiple aspects of children’s behavior, including planning, directing, and controlling abilities (e.g., Mahone & Hoffman, 2007). More narrowly, self-regulation can be defined as the partially separable constructs of executive function (EF), attentional control, and effortful control (Allan, Allan, Lerner, Farrington, & Lonigan, 2015; Blair, Urasche, Greenberg, Vernon-Feagans, & Family Life Project Investigators, 2015). From a cognitive perspective, the construct most frequently associated with self-regulation is EF; EF is a multidimensional construct defined by domain-general cognitive processes that are associated with the regulation of emotions and goal-directed behaviors.
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