Research Findings: Prior research has demonstrated the importance of young children's executive functioning (EF) skills for their success in schooling and beyond. However, the field lacks an understanding of how children's EF skills manifest in context. In the present study, we relate children's classroom off-task behavior to their EF skills.…

The goal of this work is to provide a framework for understanding the relationship between executive function (EF) to reading and other academic achievements to promote future work in this area. After briefly reviewing extant theoretical and empirical support about what is known in this area, we then more deeply evaluate the construct of EF…

Increasing mental health issues, such as emotional problems, pose a threat for the academic performance of undergraduate students. We propose a route connecting emotional problems and academic performance through executive functioning skills (EFS). Despite the abundance of research on the topic of EFS, there is a significant gap in understanding…

Self-regulated learning (SRL) and executive functions (EF) are broad concepts stemming from different research areas. They have been defined and modeled in various ways and are repeatedly related to each other in the literature, but so far, no systematic analyses of these relations have been published. Therefore, a systematic analysis of their…

In recent years awareness of the importance of executive function (EF) skills for students' academic growth has increased. Research suggests that experience in school promotes EF development; however, recommendations regarding evidence-based practices that educators can use to support EF in their classrooms are limited. Here we outline two main…

Explicit instruction is a teaching strategy that aims to avoid cognitive overload experienced by students which aims to improve academic performance. Previous research has mentioned working memory as a cognitive capacity that processes information and cognitive control and supports the success of explicit teaching on student academic performance.…

Researchers have demonstrated the important contribution of mothers' sensitive parenting to children's developing cognition over the first 5 years of life, yet studies examining sensitivity beyond the early years, controlling for earlier effects, are limited. In this exploratory study, we examined the developmental pathways through which mothers'…

Physical activity (PA) is well-documented to benefit students' executive function (EF) and academic performance. However, prevailing research has predominantly focused on domain-general EF (across academic domains) while overlooking domain-specific EF (within specific subjects). To address this gap, this opinion article proposes an integrative…

A growing number of researchers have begun to highlight the potential negative effects of the excessive use of social media on college students. In particular, college students engage in social media multitasking, in which they perform multiple tasks simultaneously. Such action could adversely influence their academic performance. Hence, on the…

Enhancing students' problem solving skills is one of the primary educational challenges. For students to succeed, it is essential to determine the elements that best develop problem-solving abilities. Using SEM, a model that shows how self-efficacy, grit, utility value, help seeking behavior and executive control contribute to problem solving…

Objective: We leveraged common genetic variation underlying ADHD, educational attainment (EA) and cognition (COG) to understand the nature of the Behavior Rating Inventory for Executive Functions (BRIEF) and its relationship to academic functioning. Method: Participants were 991 youth, ages 7 to 17, consecutively referred for neuropsychiatric…

Executive functioning (EF) deficits, such as challenges with planning, organization, and materials management, negatively impact academic performance, particularly for middle-school students with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) without intellectual disability (ID). The aim was to assess the initial efficacy of the school-based version of the…

A metacognitive learner acts in a planful way, monitors their progress, flexibly adapts their strategies, and reflects on their learning. Unsurprisingly, a metacognitive approach to learning is an important predictor of children's academic performance and many attempts have been made to promote metacognition in young children. The current…

Performance on lab assessments of executive functions predicts academic achievement and other positive life outcomes. A primary goal of research on executive functions has been to design interventions that improve outcomes like academic achievement by improving executive functions. These interventions typically involve extensive practice on…

The Hearts and Flowers (H&F) task is a computerized executive functioning (EF) assessment that has been used to measure EF from early childhood to adulthood. It provides data on accuracy and reaction time (RT) across three different task blocks (hearts, flowers, and mixed). However, there is a lack of consensus in the field on how to score the…