ATTENTIONAL FLEXIBILITY AND PERSEVERATION: DEVELOPMENTAL ASPECTS IN YOUNG CHILDREN
Abstract
Whereas a growing interest in the development of attentional flexibility (AF) and in perseverative behavior, being one marker of this component, exists in neuropsychological studies and in the domain of developmental psychopathology (e.g., PKU, infantile schizophrenia, autism and Parkinson's disease) (Pennington & Ozonoff, 1996; Stahl & Pry, 2002), only a few studies have concerned themselves with this subject in normal children. It is thus of interest to add more empirical data to the existing literature in this domain. Therefore, the aim of our study was to explore the development of AF and of perseverative errors in young preschool children with normal development, aged 1.5 to 6 years. Using set-shifting tasks of increasing difficulty level, three age groups were compared with respect to their AF skills. Results show a developmental factor underlying AF, with different levels of this form becoming more and more complex with age, ranging from a rudimentary visual form to a complex representational form of flexibility. Overall, few perseverative errors occurred and they decreased with age. Results are discussed from a developmental and neuropsychological perspective.
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Simple set-shifting tasks have been observed to be passed with few errors by children as young as 1.5 years old.
“Simple set-shifting tasks have been observed to be passed with few errors by children as young as 1.5 years old (Stahl and Pry, 2005).”
From Assessment of executive functions in school-aged children: A narrative review (2022) · cites this paper as Stahl and Pry, 2005
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References 38 · Cited by 62
- Authors
- Stahl, L., & Pry, R.
- Affiliations
- Université de Montpellier (FR)
- b Université Montpellier III, EA 1977 and Service Médico-Psychologique pour Enfants et Adolescents , CHU Montpellier, France
- Venue
- Child Neuropsychology
- Publisher
- Informa UK Limited
- Published
- 2005-04
- Volume
- 11
- Issue
- 2
- Pages
- 175-189
- ISSN
- 0929-7049 (ISSN-L)
- 1744-4136
- OpenAlex
- W1983480178
- Cited by
- 62
- References
- 38
- Citations by year
- 2026: 2 · 2025: 3 · 2024: 3 · 2023: 7 · 2022: 6 · 2021: 2 · 2020: 4 · 2019: 2 · 2018: 4 · 2016: 3 · 2015: 1 · 2014: 1 · 2013: 6 · 2012: 2
- FWCI
- 1.32
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Child Neuropsychology (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- HAL (submittedVersion)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Neural and Behavioral Psychology Studies
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Neuropsychology and Physiological Psychology › Developmental and Educational Neuropsychology
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Developmental and Educational Psychology › Child and Animal Learning Development
- Keywords
- attentional flexibility, perseveration, perseverative errors, set-shifting, executive function, preschool children, age differences, typical development
- MeSH terms
- Age Factors, Attention, Child, Child Development, Child, Preschool, Cognition, Female, Frontal Lobe, Humans, Infant, Male, Neuropsychological Tests, Pilot Projects, Mental Recall, Space Perception, Visual Perception, Statistics, Nonparametric
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