Executive Functioning Task Performance as Predicted by Linguistic and Cultural Factors Among Latin American Youth Living in the USA.

Abstract

Objective: The current study sought to gain a clearer understanding of the impact of child and parent linguistic factors, ethnic identity salience, and acculturation to both mainstream United States of America (USA) culture and their heritage culture on executive functioning task performance among Latin American youth living in the USA.

Method: Nine hundred eleven youth (Mage = 9.5, 51% female, 93% born in the USA) from the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development repository completed the Flanker Inhibitory Control and Attention Test and the Dimensional Change Card Sort Test (DCCS). Youth and parent completed demographic questionnaires and ethnic identity salience and acculturation measures.

Results: Hierarchical linear regression analyses revealed that greater parent acculturation to heritage culture and lower youth acculturation to USA culture predicted better performance on the Flanker task, and greater parent ethnic identity salience predicted better performance on the DCCS test after controlling for demographic variables (parent educational attainment and full-time employment, immigration status household) and linguistic variables (parent's preferred language, primary language spoken at home).

Conclusions: This is the first study to comprehensively examine the effects of linguistic factors, acculturation, and ethnic identity salience on executive functioning performance among Latin American youth living in the USA. Results show that parental acculturation can have a meaningful impact on their children's executive functioning, which has implications for those who work with this demographic in clinical or research settings. Culturally informed suggestions for qualitative and quantitative information gathering are provided to account for this variable when conducting neuropsychological evaluations in this population.