Relationship between
School-aged Executive Functions
and Oral Narrative Skills
By: Sarah Lambeth
Eastern Illinois University
Faculty Mentors:
Mrs. Jill Fahy
Dr. Rebecca Throneburg
Executive Functions
• Metacognitive skills necessary for successful goal
achievement (Jurado & Rosselli, 2007).
• Cognitive Processes:
▫ Attention
▫ Working Memory
• Key components:
▫
▫
▫
▫
▫
▫
Intentional determination
Planning and organization
Initiation and persistence
Flexibility/shifting
Inhibitory control
Self-monitoring and regulation
(Gioia, Isquith, Guy, & Kenworthy, 2000; Jurado & Rosselli, 2007)
Development of Executive Functions
and Narrative Skills
• Executive function development
▫ Emerge during early childhood
▫ Spurts similar to prefrontal cortex development
• Prefrontal structures of the brain are involved in
executive function skills (Jurado & Rosselli, 2007, Anderson, 2002).
• Prefrontal activation is also associated with
narrative comprehension and production tasks
(Mar, 2004).
Previous Research
• Differences in executive function profiles of different
groups (e.g., language impaired verses typical)
• Relationships between individual language skills and
isolated executive function abilities measured in
nonfunctional laboratory tasks.
▫ Carlson, Davis, & Leach, 2005; Carlson, 2005; Im-Bolter, Johnson, & PascualLeone, 2006; Cohen, Vallance, Barwick, Im, Menna, Horodesky, & Isaacson,
2000; Hoffman & Gillam, 2004; Marton, & Schwartz, 2003
• Relationship between specific aspects of language and
behavioral executive functions as displayed in everyday
environments, in preschoolers, school-age children,
and adolescents.
▫ Hughes, Turksta, & Wulfeck, 2009; Trainor, 2010; Liesen, 2011
▫ Behavior Rating Inventory of Executive Function (BRIEF)
• Relationship exists between executive functions and
written narrative ability in school-age children
▫ Hooper, Swartz, Wakely, Kruif, & Montgomery, 2002
• Research investigating narratives and ADHD has
indicated a significant relationship between specific
executive functions (working memory, planning,
attention, inhibition) and narrative skills
▫ Purvis & Tannock, 1997; Tannock, Purvis, & Schacher, 1993; MilchReich, Campbell, Pelham, Connelly, & Geva, 1999; Renz et al., 2003;
Flory et al., 2006; Luo & Timler, 2008
• Only one study has used functional measures of both
executive functions and language.
▫ Trainor, 2010
▫ BRIEF (executive functions) and Renfrew Bus Story (narrative skills)
Research Questions
1. What is the relationship between executive
function skills and narrative production and
comprehension abilities?
2. What is the relationship between executive
function skills and microstructural elements of
narrative language abilities, specifically
productivity and complexity?
Subjects
•All in a general education classroom at a Central Illinois
public school
Subject Description:
Language Measures
PPVT
CELF
CELF
CELF
CELF
Core
Receptive Expressive Language
Language Language Language
Content
CELF
Language
Structure
1st Grade
Group
104
(12)
104
(11)
106
(9)
105
(11)
105
(13)
107
(9)
3rd Grade
Group
121
(22)
107
(13)
116
(14)
108
(14)
117
(14)
109
(10)
Measure of Executive Functions:
Behavioral Rating Inventory of Executive Functions—Parent Form
(BRIEF)
• Parents rated their child’s executive function skills in the
natural environment
▫ Behavioral Regulation Index
 Inhibit Control
 Shift Control
 Emotional Control
▫ Metacognition Index





Initiate
Working Memory
Plan/Organize
Organization of Materials
Monitor
▫ Global Executive Composite
▫ T-scores of 65 and above indicate clinical significance/area of
concern
Measure of Narrative Skills:
Test of Narrative Language (TNL)
• Tasks: comprehend, retell, and generate stories
▫ Story comprehension questions (3 tasks)
▫ Story production (3 tasks)
 Story retell without picture
 Story generation with picture sequence
 Story generation with single picture
• Standardized measure of:
▫ Oral Narration (Expressive)
▫ Narrative Comprehension (Receptive)
▫ Total Narrative Language Index
Microstructure:
Index of Narrative Microstructure (INMIS)
• INMIS Complexity
• INMIS Productivity
▫ Syntactic organization
▫ Total word output and the
degree of lexical diversity
• Subcomponents
▫ Mean Length of T-unitsMorphemes (MLT-M)
▫ Proportion of Complex Tunits (PROPCOMP)
• Subcomponents:
▫ Total Number of Words
(TNW)
▫ Number of Different Words
(NDW)
Productivity= -1.60 + ( -0.0010 x MLT-W) + ( = -0.21 x PROPCOMPLEX) + (0.017 x
NDW) + ( -0.00054 x TNW) + (0.014 x COORD) + (0.0072 x SUBORD) + (0.0094 x
LENGTH) + (0.068 x COMPLEX).
Complexity= -2.84 + (0.21 x MLT-W) + ( -0.0027 x TNW) + (0.028 X COORD) +
(0.026 x SUBORD) + ( -0.085 x LENGTH) + (0/14 x COMPLEX).
Results: BRIEF and TNL Means & Standard Deviations
BRIEF GEC
BRIEF BRI
BRIEF MI
(Global Executive
Composite)
(Behavior
Regulation Index)
(Metacognition
Index)
52 (12)
52 (12)
52 (11)
Third Grade: Mean (SD)
52 (14)
52 (15)
53 (12)
Overall:
52 (12)
52 (13)
52 (11)
First Grade:
Mean (SD)
Mean (SD)
•Standard scores represented as T-scores: Mean= 50, SD= 10
•T-scores >65 are considered clinically significant (higher score = greater impairment)
Narrative
Comprehension
Oral
Narration
Total Narrative
Language Index
Mean (SD)
11 (2)
11 (2)
105 (9)
Third Grade: Mean (SD)
12 (2)
11 (3)
110 (16)
Overall:
12 (2)
11 (3)
107 (13)
First Grade:
Mean (SD)
•Subtest standard scores (SS): Mean= 10, SD= 3.
•Total Narrative Language Index: Mean= 100, SD= 15
INMIS Means and Standard Deviations
First Grade:
Mean (SD)
Third Grade:
Mean (SD)
Overall:
Mean (SD)
INMIS
Productivity
.53 (1.27)
-.26 (1.01)
.15 (1.20)
TNW
(Total number of words)
.49 (1.36)
-.25 (.94)
.13 (1.22)
NDW
(Number of different words)
.38 (1.16)
-.26 (1.09)
.07 (1.15)
INMIS
Complexity
-.79 (1.77)
-.40 (1.18)
-.61 (1.51)
MLT-M
(Mean length of T-units-morphemes)
-.34 (.70)
.14 (1.18)
-.11 (.97)
PROPCOMP
(Proportion of complex T-units)
-.41 (1.01)
-.50 (.78)
-.46 (.89)
•Standard scores represented as Z-scores: Mean= 0, SD= 1
Correlation between Executive Functions
and Narrative Skills
BRIEF
(GEC)
BRIEF
(Behavior
Regulation)
BRIEF
(Metacognition)
TNL
Narrative
Comprehension
-.345
-.307
-.378
TNL
Oral Narration
-414*
Total Narrative
Language Ability
(working memory .485*)
-.502**
-.391*
-.353
(shift -.614**)
(plan/organize -.522**,
monitor-.408*)
-.457*
-.428*
*Indicates significance at the .05 level **Indicates significance at the .01 level
Correlation between Executive Functions
and Microstructure (INMIS Productivity and Complexity)
INMIS
(Z-scores)
BRIEF
GEC
BRIEF
(Behavioral
Regulation Index)
BRIEF
(Metacognition
Index)
INMIS
Productivity
-.415*
-.391*
(shift -.509**)
-.449*
(plan/organize -.520**)
TNW
-.392*
-.369-borderline *
(shift -494**)
-.407*
(plan/organize -.499**)
-.352
-.315
(shift -.491**)
-.399*
(plan/organize -.504**)
INMIS
Complexity
-.029
.003
-.104
MLT-M
-.080
-.045
-.141
-.244
-.294
-.243
(total # words)
NDW
(# different words)
(mean length T-unit in
morphemes)
PROPCOMP
*Indicates significance at the .05 level **Indicates significance at the .01 level
Comparison to previous research
• Expressive language tasks were more strongly related to
executive functions than receptive language tasks.
▫ Confirms results from Liesen’s study using the CELF-3
(isolated tasks) and the BRIEF
• Narrative ability is strongly related to executive
functions (shift, plan/organize, and monitor).
▫ Confirms results from Trainor’s study with the preschool
population (RENFREW and BRIEF)
• Results suggest that narrative productivity is
significantly related to the executive components of
shifting (flexibility), organization, and planning.
▫ Confirms Trainor’s finding that Sentence Length on the
RENFREW was significantly related to BRIEF scores
Clinical Implications
• Suggests that expressive language skills in applied, narrative
tasks engage not only language abilities, but also executive
functions.
• Narrative language ability is strongly related to the executive
components of shifting, planning/organizing, and monitoring.
• Overall word output and diversity of vocabulary in narratives
may rely more on executive function skills than the length of Tunits and degree of syntactic complexity.
• Speech-language pathologists should assess executive functions
within their testing battery and adjust compensatory strategies
that rely on intact executive functions
Limitations
• Small, homogeneous sample
• Indirect measures of executive functions (based on
parent report) without direct measures to
supplement the data
• Few types of narrative tasks were used, including
only oral story retell and story generation with a
picture sequence and a single picture cue.
• Unable to assess macrostructure using the Narrative
Scoring Scheme (NSS)
▫ Not normed for the TNL
Future Research
• Similar study with larger, more diverse sample,
including a wider age range
• Similar study including children with language
disorders
• Study using both direct and indirect measures of
executive functions
• Treatment of executive dysfunction
References
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