Research Findings: This study examined the interrelations between fine motor skills, executive functions, and basic numerical skills in kindergarten as well as their predictive value for mathematics achievement in 2nd grade in a sample of 136 children. Structural equation modeling techniques were used to uncover the unique predictive value and…

Deficits in executive function have been associated with internalizing problems in children. Yet little is known about the mechanisms that may explain this association. Using longitudinal data across elementary school years (N = 1,364), this study examined the role of peer difficulty and poor academic performance in understanding longitudinal…

The current study evaluates the psychometric properties of the Behavior Rating Inventory of Executive Function (BRIEF) with children with Down syndrome. Caregivers of 84 children with Down syndrome rated their child's behavior with the BRIEF. Teacher ratings were obtained for 57 children. About 40% of children with Down syndrome were reported by…

Deficits in executive functions can lead to many difficulties for students with disabilities. Research has shown a strong correlation between deficits in executive functions and deficits in academic performance and social-emotional functioning. With state testing requirements, response to intervention (RTI), and positive behavior interventions and…

A central aim of research in the psychological and decision sciences is to establish interventions that enhance performance, investigating the efficacy of modern approaches to improve human inference and decision-making. Whereas the decision sciences have established interventions to reduce decision biases by promoting strategies for critical…

In the context of Social Stories™, we compared visual attention to social scenes using BoardMaker™ versus photographic stimuli among typically developing (TD) children and age-matched children with ASD. For visual attention, the dependent measures were the number of fixations and fixation time to eye, mouth, and 'other' (background) areas of…

Sex differences in autism may in part be understood by an atypical sex profile of executive function and non-executive function. In this study, we compared females and males with autism against non-autistic individuals on neuropsychological and self-report measures to examine whether any sex differences in executive function and non-executive…

This study aimed to investigate children's potential for reasoning by analogy utilizing a newly-developed computerized dynamic test, and the potential differential influence of executive functions (cognitive flexibility, attention, and planning) on static and dynamic measures of analogical reasoning. Participants included 64 children (mean age =…

This longitudinal study examined the relationship between executive function (EF) and mathematics with rural and urban preschool children. A panel of direct and indirect EF measures were used to compare how well individual measures, as well as analytic approaches, predicted both numeracy and geometry skill. One hundred eighteen children, ages 39…

Objective: The prevalence of stimulant medication misuse is rising in college students. Motivations to use stimulant medications differ from motivation to use other substances such as alcohol or cannabis. However, no previous research has examined the impact of achievement goal orientation on stimulant misuse in college students. Participants: 309…

Although professional development is widely used to improve the impacts of early childhood education, little is known about the conditions under which such interventions promote child outcomes. This study applies newly developed methods for quantifying intervention impact heterogeneity to understand whether educators' collective workplace stress…

Smartphone ownership and use by adolescents have increased rapidly over the past decade and a half. Although some educators anticipated benefits of smartphones for learning, increasing smartphone use has raised numerous concerns in school environments, including the possibility that the mere presence of a smartphone reduces students' cognitive…

The ability to represent the mental states of other agents is referred to as Theory of Mind (ToM). A developmental breakthrough in ToM consists of understanding that others can have false beliefs about the world. Recently, infants younger than 2 years of age have been shown to pass novel implicit false belief tasks. However, the processes…

Our goal in this paper is to understand the extent to which, and under what conditions, executive functions (EFs) play a role in reading comprehension processes. We begin with a brief review of core components of EF (inhibition, shifting, and updating) and reading comprehension. We then discuss the status of EFs in process models of reading…

Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is generally associated with difficulties in contextual source memory but not single item memory. There are surprising inconsistencies in the literature, however, that the current study seeks to address by examining item and source memory in age and ability matched groups of 22 ASD and 21 comparison adults. Results…