Psychometrics /Executive Function in Preschool Children

描述（由申请人提供）：执行功能是指对思想和行为的自我调节。它与认知和社会发展的几个领域有关，在自闭症和多动症的儿童障碍中发现了EF的缺陷。然而，令人惊讶的是，人们对英语发展的规范过程和指导它的因素知之甚少。由于缺乏针对学龄前儿童的普遍和适当的EF措施，有关EF的科学探究和临床实践受到了阻碍。现有措施的缺点是缺乏普遍性、冗长和不适合儿童的协议、最低限度和最高限度的影响以及不明确的任务要求。拟议的研究有三个主要目的。首先，将制定新的措施，并在30至60个月的不同儿童群体中进行试验。这些措施是多维的，简短的，并按年龄顺序排列。它们将被标准化和规范化，以便在多种环境中使用。第二，将进行纵向研究，以核实个别儿童的发展是否符合第一阶段概述的顺序。此外，该设计还将包括对可能导致英语学习个体差异的因素的评估，包括语言、符号游戏和父母输入。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Executive functioning (EF) refers to self-regulation of thought and behavior. It has been implicated in several areas of cognitive and social development and deficits in EF are found in childhood disorders of autism and ADHD. Surprisingly little is known, however, about the normative course of EF development and the factors that guide it. Scientific inquiry and clinical practice pertaining to EF have been hampered by a lack of universal and appropriate measures of EF for preschool-age children. Existing measures suffer from a lack of generalizability, lengthy and non-child-friendly protocols, floor and ceiling effects, and ill-defined task demands. The proposed research has three major aims. First, new measures will be developed and tested with a diverse population of children from 30 to 60 months of age. The measures are multi-dimensional, brief, and sequenced to be age-appropriate. They will be standardized and normed for use in multiple settings. Second, longitudinal studies will be carried out to verify that individual children's development conforms to the sequence outlined in the first phase. As well, this design will include assessment of factors that might contribute to individual differences in EF including language, symbolic play, and parental input. Lastly, building on this newly acquired knowledge of normative development, training studies will be conducted to test the effectiveness of direct instruction in the tasks and training transfer from other skills such as symbolic play. This research will form the basis for more sound intervention strategies to improve children's overall functioning.