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Victoria Raskin Annotated Bibliographies Executive Functioning Shifting

Hooper, S., Swartz, C., Wakely, M., de Kruif R., Montgomery, J. (2002) Executive functions in elementary school children with and without problems in written expression. //Journal of Learning Disabilities//, 1, 57-6

Executive functions have been deemed critical to the writing process. This research examined the executive functioning and the utility of an executive functioning model of elementary school age children (4th and 5th graders in general education and special education classes) with and without documented problems in written expression. Tasks given included initiation, working memory, set shifting domain, and inhibition/stopping domain measures and written language tests. Though few differences were found between the groups, the two groups did differ in the Word Attack subtest of the Woodcock-Johnson Reading Mastery Test. The findings concluded that the executive functions which encompass initiation and set shifting (problem solving efficiency or cognitive flexibility) and perhaps sustaining, significantly separated good writers from poor writers, although the significant finds generally had weak effect size. (Other variables may co-exist with executive functioning, the most important being reading/decoding variables). The authors acknowledged that measurement was hindered by a relatively small sample size. These findings point out the importance of executive functions in the written language process for elementary school students, but highlight the need to examine other variables that may be as least as important as executive functioning.

Biederman, J., Monuteaux, M., Doyle, A., Seidman, L., Wilens, T, Ferrero F., Morgan, C., Faraone, S. (2004) Impact of executive function deficits and Attention- Deficit/ Hyperactivity (ADHD) on academic outcomes in children. //Journal of// //Consulting and Clinical Psychology 72// (5) 757-766.

The association between executive function deficits (EFDs) and functional academic outcome was examined among children and adolescents with ADHD. Participants were 6-17 years of age split between boys and girls equally with a fairly large sampling (269 with ADHD and 226 control participants). Their hypothesis was that EFDs (distractibility, planning and organization, inhibition, set shifting, attention, visual scanning and verbal learning) would be more prevalent in children with ADHD relative to control participants without ADHD and would be associated with multiple domains of functioning. The hypothesis that EFDs are associated with multiple domains was not confirmed, but their results document those children and adolescents with ADHD and comorbid EFDs have significantly worse academic deficits (as measured by achievement scores and measures of school functioning compared with children and adolescents with ADHD without EFDs). They also found that ADHD + EFD were almost 2 times more likely to repeat a grade. Biederman et al suggest that further investigations of their EFD measure and DSM-IV ADHD subtypes could be a subject of additional analyses.

Van der Sluis, S., de Jong, P., van der Leij, A. (2004) Inhibition and shifting in children with learning deficits in arithmetic and reading. //Journal of Experimental Child Psychology 87// (3) 239-266.

The research examined executive functioning (inhibition and shifting) in children (grades 4 and 5) with specific learning disabilities in either reading or arithmetic, as well as children with deficits in both reading and arithmetic and compared their performance with the performance of a control group with normal reading and arithmetic abilities. For the purpose of the study, they defined shifting as, "Characterized by the disengagement of an irrelevant task set or strategy and the subsequent activation of a more appropriate one. (p.240) The current study shows that reading-disabled children are not characterized by deficits in inhibition or shifting. Arithmetic-disabled children also did not experience problems with inhibition or shifting per se. However, complex executive functioning tasks, which required the combinations of executive functions, did result in performance that was below that of the controls. The reading plus arithmetic-disabled group performed more slowly on the Objects-IS shifting task (a measurement of shifting ability which shared the requirement to monitor and regulate different executive functions simultaneously). The results suggest relations between reading ability and the naming of letters and digits as well as between arithmetic ability and the naming of digits and quantities. The authors raised the issue of task impurity and the use of control tasks when measuring executive functioning ability in the context of learning disabilities.

St. Clair-Thompson, H., Gathercole, S. (2006) Executive Functions and Achievement in School: Shifting, updating, inhibition and working memory. //The Quarterly// //Journal of Experimental Psychology 59// (4), 745-759.

In this study, the executive processes of shifting, visuo-spatial working memory, and inhibition were assessed in 11 and 12 year olds in relationship to their learning abilities and achievement with all participants completing a set of six executive function tasks designed to tap each of the three functions. Shifting was defined as moving backwards and forwards between multiple tasks, operations, or mental sets. Significant partial correlations were found between verbal working memory and English scores and between visuo-spatial working memory and all areas of assessment (English, mathematics and science). Inhibition was significantly associated with achievement in each curricular area. The present study failed to identify the third distinct executive factor—that of shifting. In the discussion section, the authors put forward that mental flexibility may be less differentiated from working memory and inhibition in young children than in adults.The authors suggest that a common classroom task, such as writing a sentence, has a complex structure that requires shifting between lower and higher levels of processing and although shifting did not achieve statistical significance using their measurements, it plays a key role and has important implications for educational practice.

Bull, R., Scerif, G. (2001) Executive functioning as a predictor of children’s mathematic ability: Inhibition, switching and working memory. //Developmental Neuropsychology, 19// (3) 273-293.

Children’s mathematical skills were considered in relation to executive functions. In previous research, Bull et all (1999) found that children (ages 6-9) with poorer math and basic arithmetic skills showed poorer performance of executive functioning. Using multiple measures -- including the Wisconsin Card Sorting Task (WCST), dual task performance, Stroop task and counting span, it was found that mathematical ability was significantly correlated with all measures of executive functioning, with the exception of the dual-task performance. In this study, looking further at inhibition, switching and working memory, the authors found a correlation that for children with lower mathematical ability, their performance on tasks can be tied to a lack of inhibition and poor working memory—which results in problems with switching (e.g., from addition to subtraction procedures) and the ability to evaluate new strategies for dealing with a particular math task. In addition, they found that higher math ability is associated with a lower amount of interference for irrelevant information and is also related to higher working memory. The authors proposed that longitudinal studies would allow for two distinctions: determining whether different levels of skill acquisition and executive functioning become more or less important at different ages and whether an early delay in executive functioning results in a developmental lag in learning skills, such as arithmetic.

Best, J., Jones, L. Executive Functions after age 5: Changes and correlates. (2009) //Developmental Review, 29// (3) 180-200.

This review paper outlined the importance of examining executive functioning throughout childhood (particularly grade school and adolescence, whereas previous studies have focused on pre-school children). One advantage of studying EF in school-age children is that brain neuroimagining assessments, critical for showing related changes in brain structure, function and connectivity between brain regions, can be more easily added. They explored executive function (EF) as a construct and examined two key questions. 1. Is EF best thought of as a unitary process or a set of multiple distinct processes? 2. If EF does refer to distinct component processes, how are these processes related and how does the relationship change as the child develops? Their conclusions include that when components emerge and undergo rapid change, this would suggest that they are part of the same ability—that is there is neural support for the unity-but-diversity view of EF. By examining school- aged children, it appears that the EF components appear to be related differentially to various academic subject areas; EF may contribute to children’s variability in strategy use in subject areas. The authors state that it is possible that children acquire the ability to inhibit less effective strategies in favor of new, more efficient strategies and that the children’s abilities to formulate a new plan is closely related to the selection of effective strategies.