Executive Functioning Early Intervention: How Cognitive Training Can Serve Long-term Benefits for Children with ADHD

Majors: Biology and PsychologyFaculty Mentor: Dr. Victoria Templer, Psychology Children diagnosed with ADHD in their early school days fall below average on tasks that require problem solving and effortful-control. These children lack control of their executive functioning (EF), a set of skills that require higher-order processing in the prefrontal cortex (PFC), causing them to fall behind their peers in school (Rueda et al. 2012; Zelazo 2020). Cognitive training programs that target the improvement of EF in children with ADHD have shown remarkable immediate improvements upon academic and behavioral measures, but have failed to examine their long-term implications (Kofler et al. 2018; Rueda et al. 2012). This research investigates the long-term benefits of early cognitive training (CET) for ADHD and non-ADHD children upon academic (IQ), behavioral (ANT), and white matter integrity (DTI) measures. If cognitive training has long-term benefits for children with ADHD their change in task scores will match their non-ADHD counterparts. However, if cognitive training does not have long-term benefits for children with ADHD, their change in task scores will subsequently show smaller improvements upon 10 year post evaluation. It is expected that early cognitive experiences will change behavior to allow for the installment of long-lasting connections. The earlier these connections can be made, the earlier children with ADHD can improve upon and master their EF