Executive functioning skills in male students with social-emotional disorders

The fundamental purpose of this research project was to determine the influence of executive functioning skills on the self-regulation capacities of students with emotional conditions in a classroom learning environment. In this study, executive functioning was defined as a collection of cognitive processes that were responsible for guiding, directing, and managing behavior toward the pursuit of a goal directed task. The sample for this study consisted of 57 male students in grades 3 through 5 enrolled in Frederick County Public Schools. The first group of 19 students had emotional conditions which warranted special educational placements in a separate facility outside of their home school due to significant behavioral issues. The second group of 19 students also had been diagnosed as having an emotional condition , although they received special education services in their home school. The third group of 19 students was a contrast group, and consisted of regular education students with behavioral issues, who did not qualify for special education services.; Each student's teacher completed the Behavior Rating Inventory of Executive Functioning (BRIEF). In addition, individual measures of executive functioning were ascertained by administering the Wisconsin Card Sort Test and the Category Test to each student.; The results of this study indicated that behavioral rating scales such as the BRIEF were more effective than individual measures of executive functioning, such as the Wisconsin Card Sort Test and the Category Test, in distinguishing among the groups. However, only the BRIEF variables of Emotional Control and Shift were statistically significant variables. Neither the Wisconsin Card Sort Test or the Category Test were significant variables among the groups. Lastly, there were no significant associations between academic achievement scores in reading, mathematics, and written expression and the executive functioning variables.; These findings had several noteworthy implications. First, attentional control may be a vital component of executive functioning before the application of more "higher level" problem solving skills can emerge. Second, school psychologists should consider utilizing measures of executive functioning when assessing children with behavior disorders. Third, attempting to quantify executive functioning as a single entity may be somewhat misleading.