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Poster #178 - A Person Centered Approach to Preschool Self-Regulation and School Success

Sat, March 23, 2:30 to 3:45pm, Baltimore Convention Center, Floor: Level 1, Exhibit Hall B

Integrative Statement

Introduction: Children’s readiness to handle the expectations of elementary school depends heavily on their self-regulation skills (Blair & Raver, 2015; Raver et al., 2013). Self-regulation is a broad term that includes both cognitive (e.g., attention shifting) and behavioral elements (e.g., impulse control). Both cognitive and behavioral self-regulation have been shown to uniquely predict academic and social-emotional outcomes (McClelland & Cameron, 2012); however, past studies have typically looked at cognitive and behavioral self-regulation in isolation or combined elements into a composite score. While cognitive and behavioral self-regulation likely overlap, self-regulation is multi-dimensional. Additional research is necessary to understand the interplay between the different aspects of self-regulation, as well as the different developmental roots and sequelae of unique patterns of self-regulation deficits.

Method: Data was collected from low-income children attending Head Start (N = 173, 58% European American, 25% African American, 18% Latinx; 52% female; Mage =4.67), recruited in the fall of the year before they started kindergarten. Cognitive self-regulation was measured with direct measures of inhibitory control (peg tapping; Diamond & Taylor, 1996), set shifting (DCCS; Frye et al., 1995), and working memory (backward word span; Davis & Pratt, 1995). Behavioral self-regulation was assessed with a direct measure of impulse control (walk-a-line slowly; Kochanska et al., 1996) and teacher reports of aggression (TOCA-R; Werthamer-Larsson et al., 1991) and learning behaviors (McDermott et al., 1999). Participants were followed longitudinally and elementary teachers completed measures of academic performance, social-emotional skills, and learning engagement at the end of kindergarten, 1st, 2nd, and 3rd grade.

Results: Latent profile analysis (LPA) was conducted with measures of preschool cognitive and behavioral self-regulation. Fit indices suggested a four-profile solution: pervasive dysregulation (both cognitively and behaviorally dysregulated; 30% of sample), behavioral dysregulation only (22%), average self-regulation (29%) and high self-regulation (18%; Table 1). The pervasive dysregulation group had less optimal mean scores than the rest of the sample on all cognitive and behavioral measures. The behavioral dysregulation group had deficits on all of the behavioral measures but only one of three cognitive measures (backward word span). Additional analyses will use the bias adjusted 3-step approach suggested by Bolck et al. (BCH; 2004) to assess how preschool profile membership predicts longitudinal slopes and intercepts of academic, social-emotional, and learning engagement outcomes (assessed yearly from kindergarten – 3rd grade),

Discussion: LPA results revealed unique subgroups of children as indicated by different patterns of cognitive and behavioral self-regulation, suggesting that cognitive and behavioral self-regulation are unique constructs. Additional longitudinal analyses will test the hypothesis that children demonstrating pervasive dysregulation in preschool will have the poorest trajectories and outcomes through third grade in all three outcome domains (academic achievement, social-emotional, and learning engagement) and children in the behaviorally dysregulated group will have poorer social-emotional functioning and learning engagement outcomes than the average regulation group (but will not show deficits in academic achievement). Results from the LPA paired with longitudinal analyses that demonstrate how these profiles predict growth in elementary outcomes will inform future targeted interventions designed to promote self-regulatory skills among economically-disadvantaged children.

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