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Week 11. Executive functions
- What are executive functions?
o ‘Air traffic control system' in the brain
o A child has to manage a lot of information and avoid distractions
o Involving working memory, inhibitory control and mental flexibility
o Inhibitory control: stop whatever the person is doing and for example let someone
else take a turn
o Working memory: remember what you’re supposed to be doing
o Mental flexbility: being able to adjust what you’re going to do next
o Related to school due to:
Concentration
Juggling multiple demands, follow instructions
Adapting to changing circustamstances
Workign with others
Dealing with setbacks
Inhibiting immediate rewards
- Consequences of low executive functions
o Worse school performance
o Difficulty keeping jobs
o Lower incomes
o Difficulties maintaining relationships
o Increased risk for mental health problems
o Early identification and intervention by a school psychologist can reduce the chances
of children with ADHD suffering poor outcomes
- Definition executive functioning:
o Umbrella term for various cognitive processes that give rise to goal-directed
behavior
Novel & demanding situations
Flexible adjustment
Adaptive behavior, creativity
o Monitoring and self-regulation of thoughts and action and the ability to plan your
behavior and to inhibit inappropriate responses
- People used to think executive functioning is one process
- BUT nowadays we know that executive functioning is comprised of 3 core components
- 3 core components:
- Working memory
o The ability to hold information in mind (maintentance) and mentally work with it
(manipulation)
- Inhibitory control (inhibition)
o The ability to suppress interfering thought and actions that are not relevant to the
task at hand
- Cognitive flexibility (mental flexibility, shifting, switching)
o The ability to change one’s perspective or approach to a problem, flexibly adjusting
to new demands, rules or priorities
- More complex executive functions:
, o Planning
o Reasoning
o Problem solving
o Performance monitoring
- Class recap
o Definition: umbrella term for cognitive processes important for goal-directed
behavior
o Executive functioning: important for academic success and success in life
o Three core processes: working memory, inhibitory control, and cognitive flexibility
o
Questions
- How is executive functioning related to school?
- What are the core components of executive functioning?
2. Measures of executive functions
- Research to gain insight into typical development
- Each core component has a different developmental trajectory
- Clinical or school setting
- Executive functioning often impaired in clinical groups
o ADHD
o Learning disabilities (dyslexia)
o Depression
- Measures of simple executive functioning
o Go/NoGo task
Measures ability to inhibit a prepotent response
Participants are isntructed to press a button as soon as they see a go
stimulus, while when they see a Nogo stimulus they have to refrain from
responding
More difficult to inhibit response when more Go stimulus are presented
before Nogo stimulus
o Child friendly Go-NoGo task
Used pictures of pokemon to make it more child friendly
Children made more errors in nogo trial than the adults
The more go trials before a nogo trial the more difficult it was for the
children to respond correctly
Children with ADHD have more difficulty with this
- Measures of complex executive functioning
o Advantages:
Better predictor of EF problems in daily life
Better predictor for school performance
o Disadvantages:
More difficulty to identify disability
More difficult to track development
o Tower of London
Measures planning, involves spatial problem solving
, Pieces moved 1 by 1
Tak difficulty increases with the number of moves needed to solve the
problem
Children make more moves then necessary compared to adults
Adults took more time to plan their first move
o Tower of Hanoi task
o Stroop task
Name the font of the colour, sometimes the same and sometimes different
(blue is blue/blue is red)
Measures complex inhibition
Keep a rule in mind while processing reading the word with inhibitory
control
Task is not good for children because they are not that good at reading
They faster recognize the colour instead of the word itself
o Day and night task
Child-friendly version of the stroop task
Picture of the sun and have to say night and with moon have to say day
Measure automatic response inhibition
Children make a lot of mistakes despite they know the rule
Need more time to think about it
Performance increases the most between the age of 3 and 7
o Delayed gratification task
To measure inhibition and self-regulation
The longer the child waits; the better able the child is to self-regulate
Marshmallow task
o Delayed discounting task
Self-regulation
Adults!
5 euros now or 20 in a week
Child-friendly versions of the task might use toys/candy rather than money
o Dimensional change card sorting test (DCCS)
Child friendly version of the wisconsin card sorting task
First sort cards by one dimension (color or shape), then sort cards according
to the other dimension
Measures cognitive flexibility, switching and shifting
Inability to shift is called perseveration
Inable to shift their behavior
Performance of 3 year olds similar to patients with frontal lobe damage
4 year olds perform correctly
When 3 year olds are helped they perform much better
Task difficulty influences conclusions
o Wisconsin card sorting task
More difficult than DCCS
No explicit instructions about rule
No instruction when rule changes
You have to infer sorting rule based on feedback
More appropriate for older children
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