Links Between Child Executive Function and Adjustment: A Three-Site Study
Cross-site comparisons indicate that East Asian children typically excel on tests of executive function (EF), but interpreting this contrast is made difficult by both the heavy reliance on testing in school settings and by the scarcity of studies that assess across-site measurement invariance. Addressing these gaps, our study included remote home-based assessments of EF for 1002 children (M<sub>age</sub> = 5.19 years, SD = 0.51; 49% male) from England, Hong Kong, and mainland China, as well as parental ratings of externalizing and internalizing adjustment problems (data collected between June 2021 and December 2022). The models established partial scalar invariance but did not show clear site differences. Supporting the universal importance of EF for behavioral self-regulation, EF task performance and parent-rated externalizing problems showed similar inverse associations across sites.
Authors
- Catherine Wu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0506-9774)
- Jean Anne Heng (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8083-0930)
- Caoimhe Dempsey (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1435-3205)
- Elian Fink (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0328-9685)
- Laure Lu Chen (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5696-240X)
- Zhen Wu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3655-1069)
- Siu Ching Wong
- Michelle R. Ellefson (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0407-9767)
- Rory T. Devine (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3710-7878)
- Mishika Mehrotra (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6160-5631)
- Claire Hughes (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2545-3025)
- Mikeda Jess (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8095-6384)
- Hana D’Souza (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8841-8644)
- Meaghan Edwards (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1277-2337)
- Chengyi Xu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4346-8925)
- BAO-YOU HUANG (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0674-7784)
- Louise Gray (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0006-1826-2836)
- Jiayin Zheng (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5815-1002)
Institutions
- Birmingham City University (GB)
- University of Sussex (GB)
- University of Cambridge (GB)
- Child, Adolescent and Family Mental Health (CA)
- Cardiff University (GB)
- University of Birmingham (GB)
- Tsinghua University (CN)
Publication Details
- Journal
- Child Development
- Published
- 2025-05-29
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1111/cdev.14264
- Citations
- 1
- Primary Topic
- Child and Adolescent Psychosocial and Emotional Development
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 2.31
Funders
- Tsinghua University
- Economic and Social Research Council