Re-examination of the relationships between socioeconomic status and the development of inhibitory control among preschool Korean children (사회 경제적 지위에 따른학령 전기 아동의 실행 기능 발달)

Youngon Choi (최영은); 최미혜; Nam, Minji (남민지)

Re-examination of the relationships between socioeconomic status and the development of inhibitory control among preschool Korean children

THE KOREAN JOURNAL OF DEVELOPMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY
2013, 26(4), pp.107-123
Publisher : The Korean Society For Developmental Psychology
Research Area : Social Science > Psychological Science

Youngon Choi ¹, 최미혜 ¹, Nam, Minji ¹

¹중앙대학교

Accredited

ABSTRACT

Research shows that children’s abilities to inhibit thoughts and behaviors predict academic and social successes later in life. In addition, a child’s socioeconomic status (SES) is known to predict inhibitory control and general executive functions. However, careful examination of the literature revealed that several studies reporting these findings had the following limitations: (1) they were conducted in North and South America where the factor of race was not sufficiently controlled, (2) they focused on children in schooling years, and (3) they relied on comparing arbitrary groups divided by various SES criteria. The present study tested 78 Korean preschoolers aged 3–6 to examine the unique effects of SES on the development of inhibitory control in early childhood by controlling factors of age and verbal abilities. The results indicate that maternal education, measured in the total number of schooling years, uniquely predicted inhibitory control of Korean preschoolers. This corroborated previous findings, further suggesting that parental education is critical to the development of executive functions in early childhood regardless of race, age, and verbal abilities.

KEYWORDS

executive function, inhibitory control, cognitive flexibility, socioeconomic status, maternal education

Citation status

* References for papers published after 2023 are currently being built.

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This paper was written with support from the National Research Foundation of Korea.

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