Prospective memory, executive functions and metacognitive control: An empirical approach to their structural interrelations in young elementary school children

Spiess, Manuela; Roebers, Claudia M.; Meier, Beat (12 September 2013). Prospective memory, executive functions and metacognitive control: An empirical approach to their structural interrelations in young elementary school children (Unpublished). In: 13. Kongress der Schweiz. Gesellschaft für Psychologie: Crossing Borders. Basel. 11.-12.09.2013.

Introduction
Prospective memory (PM), the ability to remember to perform intended activities in the future (Kliegel & Jäger, 2007), is crucial to succeed in everyday life. PM seems to improve gradually over the childhood years (Zimmermann & Meier, 2006), but yet little is known about PM competences in young school children in general, and even less is known about factors influencing its development. Currently, a number of studies suggest that executive functions (EF) are potentially influencing processes (Ford, Driscoll, Shum & Macaulay, 2012; Mahy & Moses, 2011). Additionally, metacognitive processes (MC: monitoring and control) are assumed to be involved while optimizing one’s performance (Krebs & Roebers, 2010; 2012; Roebers, Schmid, & Roderer, 2009). Yet, the relations between PM, EF and MC remain relatively unspecified. We intend to empirically examine the structural relations between these constructs.
Method
A cross-sectional study including 119 2nd graders (mage = 95.03, sdage = 4.82) will be presented. Participants (n = 68 girls) completed three EF tasks (stroop, updating, shifting), a computerised event-based PM task and a MC spelling task. The latent variables PM, EF and MC that were represented by manifest variables deriving from the conducted tasks, were interrelated by structural equation modelling.
Results
Analyses revealed clear associations between the three cognitive constructs PM, EF and MC (rpm-EF = .45, rpm-MC = .23, ref-MC = .20). A three factor model, as opposed to one or two factor models, appeared to fit excellently to the data (chi2(17, 119) = 18.86, p = .34, remsea = .030, cfi = .990, tli = .978).
Discussion
The results indicate that already in young elementary school children, PM, EF and MC are empirically well distinguishable, but nevertheless substantially interrelated. PM and EF seem to share a substantial amount of variance while for MC, more unique processes may be assumed.

Item Type:

Conference or Workshop Item (Speech)

Division/Institute:

07 Faculty of Human Sciences > Institute of Psychology > Psychological and Behavioral Health
07 Faculty of Human Sciences > Institute of Psychology > Developmental Psychology

UniBE Contributor:

Spiess, Manuela, Roebers, Claudia, Meier, Beat

Subjects:

100 Philosophy > 150 Psychology
600 Technology > 610 Medicine & health

Language:

English

Submitter:

Anna Maria Ruprecht Künzli

Date Deposited:

27 Jun 2014 15:05

Last Modified:

29 Mar 2023 23:33

URI:

https://boris.unibe.ch/id/eprint/46913

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