In the current article, we contrast 2 analytical approaches to estimate the relation of parenting to executive function development in a sample of 1,292 children assessed longitudinally between the ages of 36 and 60 months of age. Children were administered a newly developed and validated battery of 6 executive function tasks tapping inhibitory control, working memory, and attention shifting. Residualized change analysis indicated that higher quality parenting as indicated by higher scores on widely used measures of parenting at both earlier and later time points predicted more positive gain in executive function at 60 months. Latent change score models in which parenting and executive function over time were held to standards of longitudinal measurement invariance provided additional evidence of the association between change in parenting quality and change in executive function. In these models, cross-lagged paths indicated that in addition to parenting predicting change in executive function, executive function bidirectionally predicted change in parenting quality. Results were robust with the addition of covariates, including child sex, race, maternal education, and household income-to-need. Strengths and drawbacks of the 2 analytic approaches are discussed, and the findings are considered in light of emerging methodological innovations for testing the extent to which executive function is malleable and open to the influence of experience.
VL - 50 IS - 2 ER - TY - JOUR T1 - Poverty as a predictor of 4-year-olds' executive function: New perspectives on models of differential susceptibility. JF - Developmental Psychology Y1 - 2013 A1 - Cybele Raver A1 - Clancy Blair A1 - Michael T. Willoughby AB -In a predominantly low-income, population-based longitudinal sample of 1,259 children followed from birth, results suggest that chronic exposure to poverty and the strains of financial hardship were each uniquely predictive of young children's performance on measures of executive functioning. Results suggest that temperament-based vulnerability serves as a statistical moderator of the link between poverty-related risk and children's executive functioning. Implications for models of ecology and biology in shaping the development of children's self-regulation are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2013 APA, all rights reserved)
VL - 49 UR - http://doi.apa.org/getdoi.cfm?doi=10.1037/a0028343 IS - 2 JO - Developmental Psychology ER - TY - JOUR T1 - Demographic and familial predictors of early executive function development: Contribution of a person-centered perspective JF - Journal of Experimental Child Psychology Y1 - 2011 A1 - Rhoades, Brittany L. A1 - Mark T. Greenberg A1 - Lanza, Stephanie T. A1 - Clancy Blair KW - executive function KW - Low-income KW - Parent–child interactions KW - Person-centered KW - Profiles KW - Risk AB -Executive function (EF) skills are integral components of young children’s growing competence, but little is known about the role of early family context and experiences in their development. We examined how demographic and familial risks during infancy predicted EF competence at 36 months of age in a large, predominantly low-income sample of nonurban families from Pennsylvania and North Carolina in the United States. Using latent class analysis, six ecological risk profiles best captured the diverse experiences of these families. Profiles with various combinations of family structure, income, and psychosocial risks were differentially related to EF. Much of the influence of early risks on later EF appears to be transmitted through quality of parent–child interactions during infancy. Findings suggest that early family environments may prove to be especially fruitful contexts for the promotion of EF development.
VL - 108 UR - http://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S0022096510001633 IS - 3 JO - Journal of Experimental Child Psychology ER -