1-115 - Making Sense of Self-Regulation: Results from Programs to Improve the Control of Attention, Emotion, and Executive Functions

Session Type: Paper Symposium

Integrative Statement

Advances in neuroscience suggest that a systematic and programmatic focus on self-regulation, including executive functions, in early education and social service delivery for parents and children at high risk can enhance neurocognitive and neuroendocrine function and lead to behavioral and academic benefits with potentially long-term advantageous effects on development. This symposium presents results from three randomized trials indicating beneficial effects on child outcomes from programs focusing on self-regulation abilities in children and adults. It also addresses the complexity of self-regulation research with implications for program design, service delivery, measurement, and data analysis. Paper 1 presents positive effects of a dual-generation intervention for children in poverty that targeted selective attention and self-regulation in preschool children by engaging the larger context of parents and the home environment via both parenting and child training programs. Paper 2 presents positive effects of a school readiness intervention designed to increase children’s abilities to focus attention and regulate emotions and behavior on children with developmental disabilities. Paper 3 presents positive effects of an innovative approach to the education of children in kindergarten on executive functions, the control of attention, neuroendocrine function, and academic outcomes. Paper 4 considers the findings of each of the foregoing programs from the perspective of a framework that investigates the similarities, overlaps, and distinctions among executive functions and self-regulation constructs with the goal of generating a comprehensive heuristic to organize terms and concepts and to guide program development, delivery, and evaluation.

Sub Unit

• Cognitive Processes

Chair

• Cybele Raver, New York University

Individual Presentations

• Assessment and expansion of a dual-generation intervention targeting attention and self-regulation in at-risk preschoolers - Presenting Author: Eric Pakulak, University of Oregon; Theodore A Bell, University of Oregon; Courtney Stevens, Willamette University; Jessica Fanning, University of Oregon; Scott Klein, University of Oregon; Elif Isbell, University of Oregon; Zayra Longoria, University of Oregon; Amanda Hampton Wray, Michigan State Univ; Christina Karns, University of Oregon; Ryan Guiliano, University of Oregon; Helen Neville, University of Oregon

• Changes in Neural Correlates of Self-Regulation through a Readiness Intervention for Children with Developmental Disabilities - Presenting Author: Leslie E. Roos, University of Oregon; Katherine C Pears, Oregon Social Learning Center; Jacqueline Bruce, Oregon Social Learning Center; Jennifer Martin McDermott, University of Massachusetts, Amherst; Philip Andrew Fisher, University of Oregon

• Closing the Gap: Results from a Randomized Trial of an Innovative Approach to the Education of Children in Kindergarten - Presenting Author: Clancy Blair, New York University; Cybele Raver, New York University; Deborah J Leong, Metropolitan State College of Denver; Elena Bodrova, No Institutional Affiliation

• Mapping the Executive Function Literature: Developing a Framework to Organize Executive Function and Regulation-Related Concepts - Presenting Author: Rebecca Bailey, Harvard Graduate School of Education; Stephanie M Jones, Harvard Graduate School of Education; Ann Partee, Harvard Graduate School of Education