title: Effects of age and school type on unconstrained, phonemic, and semantic verbal fluency in children.
abstract: Biological and cultural factors have been found to have a significant influence on cognitive development and performance in neuropsychological instruments such as verbal fluency tasks (VFT). Variations of traditional VFT, involving unconstrained word production and increased retrieval times, may provide further data regarding the executive, attentional, mnemonic, and linguistic abilities involved in VFT. As such, the aim of this study was to investigate the impact of age and school type on the performance of 6- to 12-year-old children in unconstrained, phonemic, and semantic VFT. The VFT were administered to 460 participants. The effects of age and school type on verbal fluency (VF) performance were analyzed using a two-way analysis of variance, followed by Bonferroni post-hoc tests (p ≤ .05). A repeated-measures analysis was also used to evaluate VF performance over time (p ≤ .05). Main effects of age and school type were identified on all measures (effect sizes ranged from .05 to .32, p ≤ .05). VF scores increased with age and were higher among private school students. The influence of age on VFT may be associated with the development of executive functions. The impact of type of school on VF performance may be explained by the greater availability of cognitive stimulation (semantic knowledge) provided by private schools and families with better socioeconomic levels.
authors.affiliation: a Psychology Department , Pontifical Catholic University of Rio Grande do Sul , Porto Alegre , Brazil.
authors.forename: Geise Machado
authors.initials: GM
authors.lastname: Jacobsen
authors.affiliation: a Psychology Department , Pontifical Catholic University of Rio Grande do Sul , Porto Alegre , Brazil.
authors.forename: Mirella Liberatore
authors.initials: ML
authors.lastname: Prando
authors.affiliation: a Psychology Department , Pontifical Catholic University of Rio Grande do Sul , Porto Alegre , Brazil.
authors.forename: André Luiz
authors.initials: AL
authors.lastname: Moraes
authors.affiliation: a Psychology Department , Pontifical Catholic University of Rio Grande do Sul , Porto Alegre , Brazil.
authors.forename: Janice da Rosa
authors.initials: JD
authors.lastname: Pureza
authors.affiliation: a Psychology Department , Pontifical Catholic University of Rio Grande do Sul , Porto Alegre , Brazil.
authors.forename: Hosana Alves
authors.initials: HA
authors.lastname: Gonçalves
authors.affiliation: a Psychology Department , Pontifical Catholic University of Rio Grande do Sul , Porto Alegre , Brazil.
authors.forename: Larissa de Souza
authors.initials: LS
authors.lastname: Siqueira
authors.affiliation: b Centre de Recherche , Institut Universitaire de Gériatrie de Montréal , Montréal , Canada.
authors.forename: Yves
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Joanette
authors.affiliation: a Psychology Department , Pontifical Catholic University of Rio Grande do Sul , Porto Alegre , Brazil.
authors.forename: Rochele Paz
authors.initials: RP
authors.lastname: Fonseca
mesh_terms: D000367:Age Factors; D001938:Brazil / Q000453:epidemiology; D002648:Child; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007802:Language; D008297:Male; D010700:Phonetics; D000072263:Private Facilities / Q000592:standards / Q000639:trends*; D011633:Public Facilities / Q000592:standards / Q000639:trends*; D012574:Schools / Q000592:standards / Q000639:trends*; D012660:Semantics; D014705:Verbal Behavior / Q000502:physiology*
keywords: Age; children; executive functions; school type; verbal fluency