Developmental Timing of the Effects of Income and Adversity on Effortful Control and Adjustment

• In Event: 1-007 - Developmental Correlates of Effortful Control Across Childhood and Adolescence

Integrative Statement

A core aspect of self-regulation is effortful control, i.e., executive attention and inhibitory control, and effortful control is a key factor underlying children’s social-emotional competence and psychopathology. There is consistent evidence that low income and its associated accumulation of risk adversely impact the development of young children’s executive or effortful control. However, there is less evidence of the impact of these risk factors on effortful control later in childhood, with some evidence suggesting that they are unrelated to effortful control growth in preadolescence. It is possible that income and adversity disrupt the development of effortful control in early childhood, and that these early disruptions account for later associations of income and adversity to effortful control and adjustment. In this study, we examine the effects of the timing of low income and cumulative risk on effortful control from early to middle-childhood, testing whether concurrent or early childhood income predicts levels of effortful control in middle-childhood, and whether concurrent stress in middle-childhood predicts effortful control above early childhood levels.

Participants were 306 children (3 years at T1) and their mothers, who were assessed again when they were 5 (T2) and 7-8 (T3). The sample is distributed equally across income (29% at/near poverty, 30% lower, 20% middle, 21% upper-income). Mothers reported on cumulative risk (single and adolescent parent status, household density, residential instability, negative life events, maternal depression) and T5 stress (General Life Events Schedule for Children). T2 HPA-axis regulation was assessed as average diurnal cortisol morning level and slope. Effortful control was assessed using lab tasks that measured executive control (EC: day/night or stroop, bear/dragon or simon says, dimensional card sort, head-toes-knees-shoulders, NEPSY attention and inhibitory control) and delay ability (DA: gift delay). Children’s T5 internalizing, externalizing (CBCL) and social competence (SSRS) were reported by mothers.

Path analyses were conducted in Mplus using FIMLE estimation for missing data. T1 income, cumulative risk, and child sex were specified as predictors of T2 EC, DA and cortisol. T3 income, stress, and T2 EC, DA and cortisol were specified as predictors of T3 EC and DA. T3 income, stress, EC and DA were specified as predictors of T3 adjustment. Significant paths are depicted in Figure 1. T1 income predicted T2 EC; T1 cumulative risk predicted T2 cortisol. Controlling for T2 levels of EC, T3 EC was predicted by lower T1 income and higher T1 cumulative risk, even accounting for T3 income and stress. T3 DA was predicted only by T2 DA. T3 internalizing and externalizing problems were predicted by T3 income and stress, but not by EC or DA, whereas T3 social competence was predicted by T3 income and T3 EC.

Findings suggest that early low income and cumulative risk have an enduring effect on middle-childhood effortful control, maybe more so than concurrent levels of income and stress. Further, middle childhood levels of executive control relate to better social competence above the effects of income and stress, whereas, concurrent experiences of low income and stress might have more relevance for children’s internalizing and externalizing problems.

Author

• Liliana J. Lengua, University of Washington
  Presenting Author