Exploring post-error slowing in children aged 8-11: task-specific patterns and associations with cognitive and...

Area of Science:

• Cognitive Psychology
• Developmental Neuroscience
• Educational Psychology

Background:

• Post-error slowing (PES) is a key indicator of cognitive control and performance monitoring.
• Its consistency across diverse tasks and association with academic achievement in children are not well-established.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the presence and consistency of PES in children aged 8-11.
• To examine the relationship of PES across different executive function tasks and its association with academic performance and intelligence.

Main Methods:

• Utilized modified Flanker, Go/No-Go, and N-back tasks to assess PES in 8-11 year old children.
• Analyzed PES correlations within and across tasks, and its relation to mathematical grade, Italian language grade, and intelligence.

Main Results:

• Children exhibited significant PES in all tested tasks.
• PES showed positive correlations within some blocks of N-back and Go/No-Go tasks, but not across different tasks.
• PES varied based on task demands and difficulty.
• Flanker task PES positively correlated with intelligence and marginally with language achievement.

Conclusions:

• Post-error slowing in children appears to be a task-specific phenomenon.
• PES demonstrates limited generalizability across cognitive tasks and weak associations with broader cognitive and academic outcomes in this age group.