title: Social factors in the development of early executive functioning: a closer look at the caregiving environment.
abstract: This study investigated prospective links between quality of the early caregiving environment and children's subsequent executive functioning (EF). Sixty-two families were met on five occasions, allowing for assessment of maternal interactive behavior, paternal interactive behavior, and child attachment security between 1 and 2 years of age, and child EF at 2 and 3 years. The results suggested that composite scores of parental behavior and child attachment were related to child performance on EF tasks entailing strong working memory and cognitive flexibility components (conflict-EF). In particular, child attachment security was related to conflict-EF performance at 3 years above and beyond what was explained by a combination of all other social antecedents of child EF identified thus far: child verbal ability and prior EF, family SES, and parenting behavior. Attachment security may thus play a meaningful role in young children's development of executive control.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Montreal, P.O. Box 6128 Downtown Station, Montreal, QC, H3C 3J7, Canada. annie.bernier@umontreal.ca
authors.forename: Annie
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Bernier
authors.forename: Stephanie M
authors.initials: SM
authors.lastname: Carlson
authors.forename: Marie
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Deschênes
authors.forename: Célia
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Matte-Gagné
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D002652:Child Behavior; D002675:Child, Preschool; D056344:Executive Function; D005219:Father-Child Relations; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007802:Language; D008297:Male; D009034:Mother-Child Relations; D016487:Parenting; D010290:Parents; D010988:Play and Playthings; D012923:Social Class; D013060:Speech