| Executive function is the higher cognitive ability of individuals to control thoughts and behaviors to reach specific goals by coordinating multiple cognitive processes.The development of executive function in preschool is important for individuals’ future achievement in learning and life.The home literacy environment,the proximal environment to which children are directly exposed,is closely related to preschoolers’ executive functioning,but current research has focused on Western countries and the findings are inconsistent.According to ecosystem theory,socioeconomic status,as an exogenous system influencing child development,may affect the functioning of the home literacy environment as a microsystem.In addition,the intervention of parent-child language interaction in the home literacy environment and the facilitation effect on executive functioning have yet to be verified in low socioeconomic status families.Based on this,the present study examined the relationship between home literacy environment,socioeconomic status,and executive functioning and the facilitative effect of enhancing the home literacy environment on executive functioning through a cross-sectional study and a controlled experiment.In Study 1,preschool children and their fathers or mothers were used as study subjects,and Executive Function Task Battery was used to measure children’s executive function,and the parent-reported Home literacy Environment Questionnaire and Family Socioeconomic Questionnaire were used to investigate the family literacy environment and family socioeconomic status,and a total of 180 valid data were obtained.The results of the study indicated that.(1)home literacy environment significantly predicted children’s levels of inhibitory control,working memory,and cognitive flexibility.(2)Family socioeconomic status had a negative moderating effect on the effect of home literacy environment on inhibitory control and cognitive flexibility.In Study 2,based on the evidence from Study 1 that a low socioeconomic status home literacy environment had a greater effect on children’s executive functioning,children in the low executive functioning subgroup(i.e.,children who scored in the bottom 50% of the executive functioning test)were screened out of the children who participated in Study 1.Among the children in the low executive functioning subgroup,children and their mothers in the bottom 50% of the socioeconomic ranking of their families were screened for the intervention and randomly divided into two groups(11 in the experimental group and 11 in the control group).Families in the experimental group were given an 8-week parent-child reading intervention.Three home literacy environment questionnaires,parent-child reading videos,and executive function measures were conducted before,after,and two months after the intervention,respectively,and the results of the study showed that.(1)Families in the experimental group scored significantly higher than the control group on the Home Literacy Environment Questionnaire,mothers’ reading behavior,and children’s reading behavior on both the posttest and follow-up posttest after the parent-child reading intervention.(2)Children in the experimental group scored significantly higher on the Inhibitory Control,Working Memory,and Cognitive Flexibility tests on both the posttest and the follow-up posttest after the parent-child reading intervention.The two studies reveal the mechanisms underlying the role of home literacy environment,socioeconomic status and executive functioning the important influence of home literacy environment on preschool children’s executive function development and provide solutions for them.These results suggest that the home literacy environment is an important factor influencing preschool children’s executive functions,especially for children with fewer educational resources,and that focusing on improving the quality of their home literacy environment can effectively promote the development of their executive functions. |
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