The Co-development of Visual Working Memory and Executive Function in Early Childhood.

Johns, Eleanor L. (2024) The Co-development of Visual Working Memory and Executive Function in Early Childhood. Doctoral thesis, University of East Anglia.

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Abstract

Executive function is considered fundamental to cognition and academic achievement, and executive function continues to improve with age across early childhood. However, there are major challenges in how executive function is currently conceptualised in early development. There is a clear need for more longitudinal studies that track the co-development of candidate components of executive function. These components are working memory, inhibition control, and cognitive flexibility. It is important to understand these components during infancy, however there are few measures available to assess these components. A good starting point to address this is using established measures of visual working memory that are robust from infancy. In this thesis, I aim to track the co-development of visual working memory and executive function during early development, something that no prior study has currently done. This was investigated in three steps. Chapter 2 examines the longitudinal stability of visual working memory across two tasks from 6 to 54 months of age. Findings suggest visual working memory is longitudinally stable across this period. Furthermore, findings demonstrate cross-task relationships in the first longitudinal study to examine this. Next, Chapter 3 examines the longitudinal stability of executive function beginning in the toddler period. Findings suggest executive function is longitudinally stable when assessed using the same measure from 30 to 78 months of age. Importantly, results show interactions with maternal education level and gender. To examine the co-development of these two cognitive systems, Chapter 4 examines whether early measures of visual working memory predict later executive function. Findings show that visual working memory measures from 6 months of age predict executive function performance at 30 months of age. These measures at 30 months also predict executive function four years later at 78 months of age. An additional measure of visual working memory capacity from a separate task was also found to be predictive of executive function in childhood. Findings from these three chapters all show that VWM measured in infancy and childhood robustly predicts later executive function skills. These findings are discussed in relation to dynamic systems models of visual working memory and executive function as well as how these findings may inform future assessment and intervention research.

Item Type:	Thesis (Doctoral)
Faculty \ School:	Faculty of Social Sciences > School of Psychology
Depositing User:	Chris White
Date Deposited:	17 Feb 2025 09:34
Last Modified:	17 Feb 2025 09:34
URI:	https://ueaeprints.uea.ac.uk/id/eprint/98507
DOI:

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