Honors Theses

Date of Award

Spring 5-9-2020

Document Type

Undergraduate Thesis

Department

Psychology

First Advisor

Stephanie Miller

Second Advisor

Carey Dowling

Relational Format

Dissertation/Thesis

Abstract

Past research focused on how harsh parenting related to EF and behavior problems in children when other factors (i.e., maternal stress, household chaos, socioeconomic risk factors) were present. However, the literature was lacking in the examination of the relationship between EF and other parenting styles. This study aimed to examine the relationship between different aspects of executive function and regulation (i.e, inhibition, working memory, cognitive flexibility, problem solving, and impulsivity) and parenting and routines (i.e., laxness, hostility, overreactivity, and sleep and routines). To study this, parents of 18 to 24 month olds were administered a battery of EF tasks and self-report questionnaires on parenting, impulsivity, and sleep and routines in the home. I found some relations between EF and parenting. Lower scores on the working memory task were related to more problems with overreactivity and overall parenting problems. Higher scores on the inhibition task were related to less overall parenting problems. Better sleep and routines were related to fewer problems with laxness and overreactivity. Although the few relations between EF and parenting behavior was surprising, the lack of relations could be due to methodology and cultural differences in parenting.

Accessibility Status

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Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

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