Moulding environmental contexts to optimise neurodiverse executive function performance and development: A goodness-of-fit account |
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Authors: | Alexandra Hendry Gaia Scerif |
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Affiliation: | 1. Department of Experimental Psychology, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK;2. Department of Experimental Psychology, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK Contribution: Conceptualization, Writing - original draft |
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Abstract: | Executive functions (EFs) provide a top-down response to stimuli and events in pursuit of a goal. We argue that the extent to which an individual's environment is enriching and a good fit for them influences whether their performance at that moment is towards their upper- or lower-limit of EF ability. We outline the implications of this for interpreting measures of EF. We next argue that a child's sensitivity to the environment, and their caregivers' ability to modulate the environment to improve goodness-of-fit, influences the cumulative effects of the environment in shaping that child's actualised EF ability (the performance level shown in day-to-day situations), and thus their skill development. We therefore recommend that EF interventions be designed to improve children's actualised EF ability by improving their day-to-day environment, while simultaneously helping children modulate their physiological response to environmental challenges, and providing opportunities to practise EF skills in ecologically-valid contexts. |
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Keywords: | environment executive function goodness-of-fit neurodiversity |
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