Poster #92 - Family Interactions and Executive Functions of Low-Income Children : A Biological Susceptibility Perspective

• In Event: 3-206 - Poster Session 13
  In Poster Session: PS 13 Section - Family Context & Processes

Integrative Statement

The investigation and identification of factors influencing children’s development and functioning has been of interest in the field of developmental psychology (Pluess & Belsky, 2010); and even more so as to how proximal relationships with parents influence development. Researchers have found that quality of parent-child interactions is an important variable predicting children executive functions (EF) (Bernier et al., 2010; Meuwissen & Carlson, 2015). EF develop early in childhood (Garon et al., 2008) and emerge from the interplay between early brain development and environmental influences (Vernon-Feagans et al., 2016). From an evolutionary perspective, Belsky (2013) has theorized that temperamentally reactive children may show higher susceptibility to environmental influences ‘‘for better and for worse” where highly reactive children are more vulnerable to negative environments but also have a greater capacity to benefit from positive parenting. The number of studies testing this model in predicting children EF are still very limited. A review analysis revealed the importance of considering a susceptibility model for EF as the influences of parenting on EF do not operate equally across all children (Fay-Stammbach et al., 2014). For example, Conway and Stifter (2012) found that child temperament interacts with social processes to predict EF. However, studies rarely go beyond the mother-child dyad to investigate this model while considering family interactions. Such consideration is particularly important with low-income populations in which poverty exerts a burden on families and affects children's EF (Raver et al., 2013). Thus, the aim of this research is to evaluate the influence of family interactions on the development of EF in a biological susceptibility perspective among a low-income population.
Participants in this study are 50 two-parent families receiving social security benefits in the province of Quebec (Table 1). When children were between 3 and 5 years of age, quality of family interactions was assessed from direct observation of a filmed mealtime (Dickstein et al., 1994) and emotional reactivity was evaluated by the mother using a subscale of the CBCL (Achenbach & Rescorla, 2000). Three years later, children EF was assessed using the total moves score of the Tower of London, 2nd edition (Culbertson & Zillmer, 2005).
Socio-demographic characteristics were not related to the EF score. In order to test the moderation model, bootstrap analyses of the sampling distribution were performed using the PROCESS macro for SPSS (Hayes, 2009) based on 10,000 bootstrapped resamples. Results revealed an overall significant model (Table 2). The test of highest order unconditional interaction revealed a significant moderating effect, F(1,46)=4.58, p=.038. Posthoc analyses revealed that the effects of quality of mother-child interaction on EF is non-significant when children are not emotionally reactive (point estimate=-.0366, t=-.0300, CI=-2.4958–2.4226). However, a significant positive association between quality of family interaction and EF is found for emotionally reactive children (point estimate= 4.1566, t=2.7129, p=.0094, CI=1.0725–7.2408). Findings underscore the importance of positive family interactions in the development of executive functions. They also highlight the importance of supporting susceptible children who might be, by their constitution, more affected by a negative environment than less reactive children.

Authors

• Noémie Heider, Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières
  Presenting Author

• Éléonore Sabourin-Guardo, Université du Québec à Trois-rivières
  Non-Presenting Author

• Annie Bernier, University of Montreal
  Non-Presenting Author

• Chantal Cyr, University of Quebec at Montreal
  Non-Presenting Author

• Diane St-Laurent, Universite du Quebec a Trois-Rivieres
  Non-Presenting Author

• Karine Dubois-Comtois, Universite du Quebec a Trois-Rivieres
  Non-Presenting Author