Children's Family Experiences and Executive Function Across the Transition to School

Executive function (EF) serves as a “cognitive toolkit” for children’s academic and social success. Understanding how families shape young children’s EF development is crucial for reducing disparities in their outcomes. Drawing on data from two ESRC-funded UK samples, Ready or Not1 and Toddlers Up2, this thesis examines relations between EF and family experiences (interactions with parents, exposure to stressors) across the transition to formal schooling. The first study1 (N = 70) explored how different aspects of parenting predict growth in child EF over a year (Reception to Year 1). In Reception year, parents’ positive control and responsiveness (coded from remote observations of a 5-minute structured play task) showed positive concurrent associations with child EF. However, Reception children’s exposure to parental talk at home (indexed by Adult Word Count in LENA recordings) was inversely related to growth in child EF from Reception to Year 1. In the second study1 (N = 252), I examined the bidirectional associations between children’s EF and the quality of parent-child interactions during structured play. Children with better EF in Reception had more mutually positive, responsive and cooperative interactions with their parents (higher dyadic mutuality) in Year 1. By contrast, parent-child mutuality in Reception did not reciprocally predict child EF in Year 1. In the third study1 (N = 252), I tested whether COVID-related family stress in Reception predicted poor concurrent and later child EF, and whether this association was attenuated in the context of high family socioeconomic status and parent-reported couple relationship satisfaction. COVID-related family stress was negatively associated with concurrent child EF but did not predict EF over time. No moderating effects were found. The final study2 (N = 142) considered the role of parent-child mutuality and family-based stressors across multiple time points in a younger, demographically diverse sample. Results showed that higher cumulative risk exposure at age 2 was associated with poorer EF at ages 2 and 4. Parent-child mutuality at age 3 was unrelated to age 4 EF, but children with better EF at age 2 displayed more mutuality with their mothers at age 3. Collectively, these findings suggest that children’s EF is susceptible to family-based stress, with an enduring negative impact when children are exposed to a greater number of risk factors. Moreover, individual differences in EF appear to shape children’s interactions with parents in both toddlerhood and the early school years. Using multiple measures and longitudinal structural equation modelling, this thesis highlights the importance of considering transactional child effects and temporal dynamics in both theory and practice.

Name dc:type.qualificationname

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Level dc:type.qualificationlevel

Doctoral

Grantor dc:publisher.institution

University of Cambridge

Year dc:date.issued

2024

Author dc:creator

• Mehrotra, Mishika

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Hughes, Claire

• executive functions
• parent-child interactions
• early school years
• COVID-19 family stress
• LENA
• cumulative risk

Licence

• https://apollo8-f-pro.lib.cam.ac.uk/bitstreams/b85a1459-41dd-4976-8a22-e6ba2a199725/download
• http://purl.org/NET/rdflicense/allrightsreserved

Language dc:language

eng

DOI dc:identifier.doi

https://doi.org/10.17863/CAM.117162

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:www.repository.cam.ac.uk:1810/382274