The factor structure of executive function in childhood and adolescence

Executive functioning (EF) plays a major role in many domains of human behaviour, including self-regulation, academic achievement, and even sports expertise. While a significant proportion of cross-sectional research has focused on the developmental pathways of EF, the existing literature is fractionated due to a wide range of methodologies applied to narrow age ranges, impeding comparison across a broad range of age groups. The current study used a cross-sectional design to investigate the factor structure of EF within late childhood and adolescence. A total of 2166 Flemish children and adolescents completed seven tasks of the Cambridge Brain Sciences test battery. Based on the existing literature, a Confirmatory Factor Analysis was performed, which indicated that a unitary factor model provides the best fit for the youngest age group (7–12 years). For the adolescents (12–18 years), the factor structure consists of four different components, including working memory, shifting, inhibition and planning. With regard to differences between early (12–15 years) and late (15–18 years) adolescents, working memory, inhibition and planning show higher scores for the late adolescents, while there was no difference on shifting. The current study is one of the first to administer the same seven EF tests in a considerably large sample of children and adolescents, and as such contributes to the understanding of the developmental trends in EF. Future studies, especially with longitudinal designs, are encouraged to further increase the knowledge concerning the factor structure of EF, and the development of the different EF components

Children involved in team sports show superior executive function compared to their peers involved in self-paced sports

Children’s motor and cognitive functions develop rapidly during childhood. Physical activity and executive function are intricately linked during this important developmental period, with physical activity interventions consistently proving to benefit children’s executive function. However, it is less clear which type of physical activity shows the strongest associations with executive function in children. Therefore, this study compared executive function performance of children aged 8 to 12 that either participated in team sports or self-paced sports, or were not involved in any kind of organized sports (non-athletes). Results demonstrate that children participating in team sports show superior executive function compared to children participating in self-paced sports and non-athletes. Importantly, children participating in self-paced sports do not outperform non-athletes when it comes to executive function. This study is the first to show that even at a very young age, team sports athletes outperform athletes from self-paced sports as well as non-athletes on a multifaceted and comprehensive test battery for executive function. Furthermore, our findings support the hypothesis that cognitively engaging physical activity, such as participation in team sports, might show stronger associations with executive functioning compared to other types of sports and physical activity

Differences in expertise level for anticipatory skill between badminton ‘in game’ strokes and serves

Over the past decades, researchers in racquet sports have been testing the role of visual anticipation and expert attunement to essential kinematic information for responding to ‘in game’ strokes as well as serves. However, anticipatory behaviour to both strokes has not been compared directly, in spite of the different characteristics of these strokes in the context of badminton. Therefore, this study explored the differences in anticipatory behaviour among elite (n = 26), competitive (n = 15) and novices (n = 17) between in game strokes and serves in badminton by use of lab based video temporal occlusion tests. In two separate blocks, last strokes (LS) and serves (S) were presented with different occlusion points (− 200 and − 100 ms before shuttle–racquet contact, at shuttle–racquet contact, and  + 100 after shuttle–racquet contact) in a randomised order. The main results from the analysis of variance were that (a) elites generally showed faster and more accurate responses, and (b) responses were generally faster in LS conditions than in serves. These results add to the current body of knowledge on anticipatory behaviour in racquet sports, and the practical implications for coaching and training are discussed

The Development of Perceptual-Cognitive Skills in Youth Volleyball Players

In many sports, elite players outperform novices on tests for perceptual-cognitive skills such as anticipation, decision making and pattern recall. However, the developmental trajectory of these perceptual-cognitive skills has received limited attention. Therefore, this study examined the development of anticipation, decision making and pattern recall in 202 female volleyball players aged between 7 and 26 years old. Participants were categorized into six age groups: U9, U11, U13, U15, U17 and Seniors. Using a video-based occlusion protocol, we assessed participants’ ability to predict pass direction, decide the most optimal attack zone, or recall the opponents’ defense positions. Results demonstrated that U17 and adult players had superior accuracy and shorter response times than younger players on all three tests. Notably, U9 players performed worse than older players on all tests. Binominal distributions showed that decision making was above chance for U17 players and adults, whereas anticipation was above chance for almost all players. Our findings indicate that age-related improvements of perceptual cognitive skills are evident at 11 years old. However, decision making seems to develop considerably later than anticipation and pattern recall, suggesting different developmental trajectories for the different perceptual-cognitive skills. Longitudinal research regarding the development of perceptual-cognitive skills and their underlying mechanisms is warranted, as this could have important implications for talent detection and development

The factor structure of executive function in childhood and adolescence

Executive functioning (EF) plays a major role in many domains of human behaviour, including self-regulation, academic achievement, and even sports expertise. While a significant proportion of cross-sectional research has focused on the developmental pathways of EF, the existing literature is fractionated due to a wide range of methodologies applied to narrow age ranges, impeding comparison across a broad range of age groups. The current study used a cross-sectional design to investigate the factor structure of EF within late childhood and adolescence. A total of 2166 Flemish children and adolescents completed seven tasks of the Cambridge Brain Sciences test battery. Based on the existing literature, a Confirmatory Factor Analysis was performed, which indicated that a unitary factor model provides the best fit for the youngest age group (7–12 years). For the adolescents (12–18 years), the factor structure consists of four different components, including working memory, shifting, inhibition and planning. With regard to differences between early (12–15 years) and late (15–18 years) adolescents, working memory, inhibition and planning show higher scores for the late adolescents, while there was no difference on shifting. The current study is one of the first to administer the same seven EF tests in a considerably large sample of children and adolescents, and as such contributes to the understanding of the developmental trends in EF. Future studies, especially with longitudinal designs, are encouraged to further increase the knowledge concerning the factor structure of EF, and the development of the different EF components