Cognitive control (also referred to as executive functions) corresponds to a set of cognitive processes that support the goal-directed regulation of thoughts and actions. It plays a major role in complex activities and predicts later academic achievement. Importantly, while growing up, children are progressively transitioning from engaging…

The current study investigated the effects of metacognitive and executive function (EF) training on childhood EF (inhibition, working memory [WM], cognitive flexibility, and proactive/reactive control) and academic skills (reading, reasoning, and math) among children from disadvantaged backgrounds. Children (N = 134, M[subscript age] = 8.70 years)…

The present study investigated the role of executive functions in the development of two aspects of timing: temporal reproduction and comparison. Children aged 7 and 10 years and young adults were asked to either reproduce target durations (i.e., reproduction task) or judge the similarity of two target durations (i.e., comparison task). These…

This longitudinal study investigates whether the development in executive control and bilingual experience predicts change in language control in bilingual children. Children were tested twice over the course of 1 year, using the language-switching paradigm and the Simon task. The participants were Japanese-English bilingual "returnee"…

Emerging cognitive control supports increasingly adaptive behaviors and predicts life success, while low cognitive control is a major risk factor during childhood. It is therefore essential to understand how it develops. The present study provides evidence for an age-related shift in the type of information that children prioritize in their…

Although there is substantial evidence that socioeconomic status (SES) predicts children's executive function (EF), the mechanisms underlying this association are poorly understood. This study tested the utility of two theories proposed to link SES to children's EF: the family stress model and the family investment model. Data came from the…

Emerging executive control supports greater autonomy and increasingly adaptive behavior during childhood. The present study addressed whether children's greater monitoring of how they engage control drives executive control development. Gaze position was recorded while twenty-five 6-year-olds and twenty-eight 10-year-olds performed a self-paced…

Executive control development typically has been conceptualized to result from quantitative changes in the efficiency of the underlying processes. In contrast, the present study addressed the possibility of qualitative change with age by examining how children and adults detect task switches. Participants in three age groups (5- and 10-year-old…

The present study addressed whether developmental improvement in working memory span task performance relies upon a growing ability to proactively plan response sequences during childhood. Two hundred thirteen children completed a working memory span task in which they used a touchscreen to reproduce orally presented sequences of animal names.…

Despite acknowledgement of the importance of executive control for learning and behavior, there is a dearth of research charting its developmental trajectory as it unfolds against the background of children's sociofamilial milieus. Using a prospective, cohort-sequential design, this study describes growth trajectories for inhibitory control…