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Cited by 556Early Childhood Education and DevelopmentCognitive Abilities and TestingDevelopmental and Educational Neuropsychology

A meta‐analysis of the relationship between socioeconomic status and executive function performance among children

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Lawson, Gwendolyn M., Hook, Cayce J., Farah, Martha J.·2018·Developmental Science
DOI 10.1111/desc.12529PMC PMC5821589
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Abstract

The relationship between childhood socioeconomic status ( SES ) and executive function ( EF ) has recently attracted attention within psychology, following reports of substantial SES disparities in children's EF . Adding to the importance of this relationship, EF has been proposed as a mediator of socioeconomic disparities in lifelong achievement and health. However, evidence about the relationship between childhood SES and EF is mixed, and there has been no systematic attempt to evaluate this relationship across studies. This meta‐analysis systematically reviewed the literature for studies in which samples of children varying in SES were evaluated on EF , including studies with and without primary hypotheses about SES . The analysis included 8760 children between the ages of 2 and 18 gathered from 25 independent samples. Analyses showed a small but statistically significant correlation between SES and EF across all studies ( r random = .16, 95% CI [.12, .21]) without correcting for attenuation owing to range restriction or measurement unreliability. Substantial heterogeneity was observed among studies, and a number of factors, including the amount of SES variability in the sample and the number of EF measures used, emerged as moderators. Using only the 15 studies with meaningful SES variability in the sample, the average correlation between SES and EF was small‐to‐medium in size ( r random = .22, 95% CI [.17, .27]). Using only the six studies with multiple measures of EF , the relationship was medium in size ( r random = .28, 95% CI [.18, .37]). In sum, this meta‐analysis supports the presence of SES disparities in EF and suggests that they are between small and medium in size, depending on the methods used to measure them.

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  • Early life experiences of scarcity have long-lasting effects on people's executive functioning.

    “For example, early life experiences of scarcity have long‐lasting effects on people's executive functioning.”

    From Human Capital and Administrative Burden: The Role of Cognitive Resources in Citizen‐State Interactions (2020) · cites this paper as Lawson, Hook, and Farah 2018

    The Discussion (page unavailable) says the association between socioeconomic status and executive function appears stable across childhood, supporting persistence during that period. But the paper summarizes correlations among children; it does not establish that early scarcity causes lasting effects on people's executive functioning beyond childhood. (LLM, conf=0.87)

    Experimental — accuracy not yet measured

  • Meta-analyses show a medium-size correlation between childhood socioeconomic status (SES) and executive functioning in children and in adult life.

    “Meta‐analyses show a medium‐size correlation between childhood socioeconomic status (SES) and executive functioning in children (Lawson, Hook, and Farah 2018) as well as executive functioning in adult life (Mittal et al. 2015, 10; Paál, Carpenter, and Nettle 2015).”

    From Human Capital and Administrative Burden: The Role of Cognitive Resources in Citizen‐State Interactions (2020) · cites this paper as Lawson, Hook, and Farah 2018

    The Abstract reports a correlation between SES and executive function in children, but describes the overall effect as small (r = .16). It reports a medium-sized effect only for the subset of six studies using multiple executive-function measures (r = .28). The adult-life clause is attributed to other citations, not Lawson et al. (LLM, conf=0.90)

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Cited by

Sorted by citations

Authors
Lawson, G. M., Hook, C. J., & Farah, M. J.
Affiliations
  • University of Pennsylvania (US)
  • Stanford University (US)
Corresponding author
Lawson, Gwendolyn M.
ORCID
Venue
Developmental Science
Publisher
Wiley
Published
2017-05-30
Volume
21
Issue
2
ISSN
  • 1363-755X (ISSN-L)
  • 1467-7687
DOI
10.1111/desc.12529
PMC
PMC5821589
OpenAlex
W2619467844
Cited by
556
References
28
Citations by year
2026: 73 · 2025: 86 · 2024: 74 · 2023: 68 · 2022: 87 · 2021: 63 · 2020: 52 · 2019: 30 · 2018: 20 · 2017: 3
FWCI
10.92
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/termsAndConditions#vor (vor)
Locations
  • Developmental Science (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (acceptedVersion)
  • PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
  • ScholarlyCommons (University of Pennsylvania) (submittedVersion)
Funders
National Institutes of Health (R01‐HD055689)
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Education › Early Childhood Education and Development
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Cognitive Abilities and Testing
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Neuropsychology and Physiological Psychology › Developmental and Educational Neuropsychology
Keywords
socioeconomic status, executive function, children, socioeconomic disparities, range restriction, moderators, health disparities
MeSH terms
Achievement, Adolescent, Attention, Child, Child Development, Child, Preschool, Female, Humans, Male, Social Class, Executive Function

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