Executive function of Spanish-speaking language-minority preschoolers: Structure and relations with early literacy skills and behavioral outcomes

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jecp.2015.11.003Get rights and content

Highlights

  • Measured executive function (EF) of Spanish-speaking language minority preschoolers.

  • Confirmatory factor analyses demonstrated that EF is a multidimensional construct.

  • Identified distinct but correlated inhibitory control and working memory factors.

  • Obtained measurement and structural invariance across language of administration.

  • Found strong relations of IC and WM with measures of early literacy and behavior.

Abstract

Young children’s executive function (EF) is increasingly recognized as an important construct associated with development in cognitive and socioemotional domains. To date, however, few studies have examined EF in populations of language-minority children. In this study, 241 Spanish-speaking language-minority preschoolers who ranged in age from 38 to 69 months (M = 54.23 months, SD = 6.17) completed three tasks designed to measure inhibitory control (IC) and four tasks designed to measure working memory (WM). Children completed assessments of their vocabulary skills, early literacy skills, and behavioral self-regulation in both English and Spanish, and their classroom teachers completed three behavior rating measures. Children were classified as more proficient in English or Spanish based on their scores on the vocabulary measures, and all IC and WM measures were administered in the children’s more proficient language. Results of confirmatory factor analyses supported a two-factor model of EF for both groups of children as well as strong measurement and structural invariance across groups. Children’s EF was substantially related to the language, early literacy, and behavioral self-regulation measures as well as teacher ratings of inattention and hyperactivity/impulsivity. For children with more proficient English, EF was associated with skills in both English and Spanish; however, for children with more proficient Spanish, EF was associated primarily with skills in Spanish. These results provide evidence of strong correspondence for EF measured in Spanish-speaking language-minority preschoolers and monolingual preschoolers, and they identify a potential key factor that can enhance understanding of development in this population of children.

Introduction

Over the past decade, there has been an increasing focus on young children’s self-regulation as an important developmental construct that is associated with other important developmental outcomes, including academic achievement and socioemotional functioning. One area of self-regulation that has received a significant amount of attention is executive function (EF). EF represents a set of interrelated domain-general cognitive skills that are linked with development of the prefrontal cortex and its role in activating and inhibiting activity in other brain regions (Garon, Bryson, & Smith, 2008). Although there are several models of EF (e.g., Barkley, 2001, Duncan and Owen, 2000), one of the most commonly studied models was developed by Miyake, Friedman, Emerson, Witzki, and Howerter (2000) based on factor-analytic work with adults. This model includes three correlated but distinct dimensions: inhibitory control (IC), updating/working memory (WM), and shifting. IC represents the capacity to withhold a predisposed response, often in favor of a non-predisposed response. WM represents the capacity to hold information in memory and either manipulate that information or update it based on ongoing sensory input. Shifting represents the capacity to alternate between sets of stimulus–response rules.

Children’s EF is related to academic and behavioral outcomes both during early childhood (e.g., Allan et al., 2014, Schoemaker et al., 2013, Thorell et al., 2004) and during middle childhood (e.g., Arrington et al., 2014, Brocki et al., 2010). Higher levels of EF are associated with higher scores on measures of language, literacy, and math, and with lower levels of problematic behaviors. Given these linkages, knowledge of the nature and development of EF may lead to better methods of understanding factors influencing early development, which in turn may result in better early identification of children at risk for academic or socioemotional difficulties. Although there is a growing literature concerning EF in monolingual children, little research to date has examined the nature and developmental correlates of EF with children whose home language is different from the societal language. Many children whose home language is not the societal language experience substantial difficulties related to academic achievement (Hemphill, Vanneman, & Rahman, 2011). Consequently, the goals of this study were to examine the nature of EF with a group of preschool children whose home language was Spanish and to determine the relations between EF and these children’s academic skills and classroom behaviors.

Although studies that include children as young as 8 years (Lehto, Juujärvi, Kooistra, & Pulkkinen, 2003) have replicated the three-factor model of EF, other studies indicate that a two-factor model (i.e., WM and IC/shifting) adequately describes children’s EF (Lee et al., 2013, Van der Sluis et al., 2007). Lee et al. (2013) reported that a three-factor model in which shifting and IC were separate factors was supported only for their oldest group of children (13 years). Results of some studies support a simpler one-factor model of EF with preschool-age children (e.g., Wiebe et al., 2008, Wiebe et al., 2011, Willoughby et al., 2010). In contrast, other studies of preschool children indicate that EF is best represented by distinct WM and IC factors (e.g., Lerner and Lonigan, 2014, Schoemaker et al., 2012). Overall, the developmental structure of EF seems to be characterized by a pattern of increasing complexity as a function of development. Studies of children between 36 and 48 months of age tend to report a single EF factor (e.g., Wiebe et al., 2008, Wiebe et al., 2011, Willoughby et al., 2010), whereas studies of children between 49 and 60 months of age tend to report two factors (e.g., Lerner and Lonigan, 2014, Schoemaker et al., 2012) and studies of adolescents report three factors (e.g., Lee et al., 2013).

Children in the United States whose families speak a language other than English at home (i.e., language-minority children) comprise approximately 9% of public school students (National Center for Educational Statistics, 2014). These families represent a substantial and rapidly growing proportion of households in the United States. For instance, according to the 2011 U.S. Census Bureau report, 60 million households use a primary language other than English, and Spanish was the primary language in approximately 37 million of these households (U.S. Census Bureau, 2011). Compared with the 2000 census (U.S. Census Bureau, 2000), these estimates represent a 29% increase overall and a 34% increase in the number of households in which Spanish is the primary language. Similar to the school-age population, language-minority children represent a substantial number of children served in early childhood education settings. For example, 30% of children enrolled in Head Start or Early Head Start in 2012 were from homes in which a language other than English was spoken (Administration for Children and Families, Early Childhood Learning and Knowledge Center, 2012).

Despite the cultural, linguistic, and economic diversity present within this population, Spanish-speaking language-minority children experience a greater risk of negative outcomes in both academic and behavioral domains than do their monolingual English-speaking peers. For instance, children who are English-language learners (ELLs; i.e., language-minority children who have limited English proficiency) are less likely than their monolingual peers to meet national standards in reading and math in both fourth and eighth grades (National Center for Educational Statistics, 2013). Children who are ELLs also are more likely than their monolingual peers to experience internalizing (e.g., anxious, depressed; Twenge & Nolen-Hoeksema, 2002) and externalizing (e.g., inattentive, noncompliant, aggressive; Dawson & Williams, 2008) symptoms. Consequently, it is important to understand how factors such as EF, which influence academic and behavioral outcomes, develop among language-minority children.

Compared with the literature on the development and developmental significance of EF with younger monolingual children, there are few studies in which the development and developmental influences of EF among younger language-minority children have been examined. In a series of reports on two samples of Spanish-speaking children first assessed when they were in first grade, Swanson and colleagues (e.g., Swanson, 2015, Swanson et al., 2004) reported that WM was associated concurrently and longitudinally with children’s language and reading skills in both Spanish and English, with some evidence of language specificity (i.e., Spanish WM predicted Spanish outcomes and English WM predicted English outcomes), depending on the sample and analysis.

Several studies in which the relations between IC and academic outcomes were examined in preschool and kindergarten samples included a substantial number of children identified as Spanish speakers (McClelland et al., 2007, Ponitz et al., 2009). Although these studies demonstrated that children with higher levels of IC measured at the start of preschool or kindergarten had higher scores on measures of literacy-related and math skills both concurrently and longitudinally, children’s language status was included only as a main effect in the analysis. Consequently, the similarity or differences in relations of EF for Spanish-speaking versus monolingual English-speaking children could not be determined. Moreover, these studies used a single measure to index children’s EF.

Some evidence suggests that the task of managing multiple languages accelerates the development of EF in bilingual children. Bialystok and Martin (2004) theorized that bilingual individuals need to inhibit one language when the other is used because both languages are activated simultaneously during speech production. In this way, language use recruits inhibitory processes in bilingual but not monolingual speakers, resulting in more opportunities for bilingual individuals to use and develop EF. Much of the evidence of a bilingual advantage in EF comes from studies of adults or studies of children from higher socioeconomic status (SES) families (e.g., Barac and Bialystok, 2012, Esposito et al., 2013). Studies with younger children and children from less advantaged backgrounds have produced results that are both consistent (e.g., Yang, Yang, & Lust, 2011) and inconsistent (e.g., Wanless, McClelland, Tominey, & Acock, 2011) with a bilingual advantage.

In this study, the measurement and developmental significance of EF were examined in a relatively large group of Spanish-speaking preschool children. Multiple tasks hypothesized to represent IC and WM were administered to children. Tasks hypothesized to represent shifting were not included because of the limited evidence that shifting is a component of EF that is distinct in young children (e.g., Lee et al., 2013). These tasks were administered to the children in either Spanish or English, depending on the child’s more proficient language. All children completed measures of language, early literacy, and behavioral self-regulation that were administered in both Spanish and English, and teachers completed ratings of children’s behavior.

There were three interrelated goals of this study. The first goal was to examine the structure of EF among Spanish-speaking preschool children. It was hypothesized that the structure of EF would be best characterized as a two-factor model with distinct but correlated WM and IC factors. The second goal was to determine whether language of task administration influenced the measurement and structure of EF. It was expected that the same factor structure would emerge whether EF was measured in English or measured in Spanish. The third goal was to determine the relations between IC and WM and measures of early literacy skills and behavioral outcomes as well as whether these relations were moderated by the language of EF task administration. Based on prior findings from samples of monolingual English-speaking children and preliminary evidence from samples including language-minority children, it was expected that higher levels of EF would be associated with stronger early literacy skills in both languages and more positive behavioral outcomes (i.e., lower scores on teacher reports of problem behaviors) and that these relations would not be moderated by language of administration of EF tasks. Confirmatory factor analysis was used to identify the dimensionality of EF and to determine whether language of administration for the EF tasks affected this structure. Structural equation models were used to examine relations between dimensions of EF and children’s skills in language, early literacy, behavioral self-regulation, and teacher ratings of child behaviors.

Section snippets

Participants

The 241 children who participated in this study were recruited from a total of eight private, public, and Head Start preschool centers in either central Florida (n = 143) or southern New Mexico (n = 98). All of the children’s teachers and teacher’s aides (N = 36) were female, and 81% were Latina. Most teachers reported that they were born in the United States (56%), and 61% of teachers reported speaking Spanish regularly outside of the classroom (only 25% reported speaking primarily Spanish in the

Descriptive statistics

As a group, children in this study scored in the low-average (print knowledge) to below-average (definitional vocabulary and phonological awareness) range on the standardized measure of early literacy skills in English. Descriptive statistics for the language and literacy measures, the behavioral self-regulation measures, and the teacher ratings of children’s behavior are shown in Table 1 separately for children who completed the EF measures in English and children who completed the EF measures

Discussion

The goals of this study were to examine the structure of EF for Spanish-speaking language-minority preschool children and to examine the relations between these children’s EF and their scores on measures of academic and behavioral functioning. The results indicated that EF was best characterized as a multidimensional construct consisting of correlated IC and WM components. Identical structures of EF were obtained from children who completed EF tasks in English and children who completed EF

Acknowledgments

This research and article were supported by grants from the Institute of Education Sciences, U.S. Department of Education (R305A090169), and the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (HD052120 and HD060292). The views expressed here are those of the authors and have not been reviewed or approved by the granting agency.

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