Executive functioning (EF) may sound like professional lingo. But these words represent a concept that is crucial to your child’s development and play a pivotal role in social interactions. From the meaning behind this term, to the ways it impacts the social development and behaviors of children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) and learning disorders, read on for more information on executive functioning.
What Is Executive Functioning?
Simply stated, executive functioning allows your child (or anyone for that matter) to execute tasks. This developmental area includes a set of cognitive (mental) skills that help the child to plan, focus, remember and engage in multiple tasks at the same time. Working memory, flexible thinking and self-control come together to help the child set goals, inhibit impulses when needed, communicate effectively, understand someone else’s point of view, self-monitor, regulate emotions and use language.
Children aren’t born with the ability to engage in the skills and activities executive functioning will someday help them to perform. But over time, they will gradually develop these abilities—as they build new cognitive, emotional and social skills.
How Does the Development of Executive Functioning Impact the Child?
The answer to this question is not the same for every child. Your child is an individual and their developmental strengths, areas for improvement, communication patterns and behaviors may look or seem very different from another child. Both neurotypical and neurodivergent children may experience difficulty with tasks that require executive functioning. These often include paying attention and staying focused, organization, sequencing information and emotional self-regulation. They may also struggle to plan or for future events or carry out multi-step activities.
Impaired executive functioning can affect children in every area of their life. This includes both the home and school environment. A child who struggles with executive functioning related tasks may have difficulty controlling what they say to their peers, persistently ask the same question to others, have difficulty regulating the level of emotions expressed in responses to different situations (everyday situations and more stressful scenarios). Children with executive functioning deficits may need prompts or assistance to initiate conversations in a socially appropriate way. Many of these children benefit from explicit learning centered around noticing social contexts (time, place, situation) and verbal and non-verbal social cues. For example, children with EF issues may not recognize the appropriate context for initiating a conversation vs. remaining quiet.
Some children may also find it challenging to understand that they should speak to or communicate with different people in different ways or adjust the quality and types of interactions they have. In doing this, a child may talk to their classmate and teacher in the same way or address their parent as they would a peer. These kiddos face disciplinary action if they are interrupting superiors or impeding group learning at school. Other executive function-related social and communication issues include introducing irrelevant topics, offering too much information, not offering enough information and poor self-awareness and monitoring of interpersonal interactions.
Even though the list of possible ways that executive functioning could impact a child’s social and communication skills may seem long, this doesn’t mean every child will experience every challenge. Some children may have little to no problems in social situations, while others could have difficulty with one, two or a few of these areas.
How Can Children Develop Executive Functioning and Social Skills?
There is no “cure” or medication for executive functioning deficits. But there are strategies available that can help children to manage social situations, improve communication and build executive function skills. According to a 2014 research review published in the journal Frontiers of Psychology, social interactions can help to facilitate executive function development—and vice versa!
Keep in mind, there isn’t one type of social interaction strategy or one therapeutic approach that works well for every child. Again, each individual child has different overall needs -- and therefore different therapy needs. Beyond this, your child has their own preferences, expectations, goals and feelings about how, when and why they interact with others. These factors can significantly impact therapy, the types of social situations your child enters and the next steps they take.
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