Autism severity level affects working memory and planning but not inhibition, shifting and emotional control.

Autistic children often have difficulties in executive functions (EF). These difficulties can, in turn, affect their everyday functioning. It is less clear in what way EF are affected by the severity of autism symptoms in children. We hypothesize that autism severity level does not have the same effect across the different components of EF. In this study, we examined how EF are affected by the autism severity level in a sample of 52 autistic children aged 4-7 years (mean age- 5.4 years, SD- 0.9 years). EF were measured through teachers' reports on the Behavior Rating Inventory of Executive Functions- Preschool Version. Autism severity level was measured with the Social Communication Questionnaire- Current Form. The results of this study showed that autism severity level impacted two EF, namely Planning and Working memory, and did not affect three EF components: Inhibition, Shifting, and Emotional Control. These results indicate that the cool or cognitive EF are more affected by autism severity level than hot EF. We conclude the article with suggestions for improving EF in autistic children.

Factor structure of the BRIEF-P teacher version in a sample of Bosnian preschool children with intellectual disability.

Executive functions (EF) play a key role in child's development as they are necessary prerequisites for everyday functioning and later academic success. Much research has been directed at examining whether EF are unidimensional or multidimensional construct. In this study, we tested two theoretically driven models and one mathematically driven EF model based on the Behavior Rating Inventory of Executive Functions - Preschool Edition (BRIEF-P). The sample for this study consisted of 102 children with intellectual disability (77 boys, 25 girls), aged 40-71 months (mean age- 62.1 months, SD- 7.6 months). Early childhood special education teachers completed the BRIEF-P Teacher Version. Confirmatory Factor Analysis was used to assess the validity of different EF models. The original BRIEF-P, with a second-order, three-factor model and one-factor model were not a good fit to the data. Mathematically driven one-factor model, with the addition of correlated errors between the scales of working memory and shift, and working memory and plan/organize was a good model fit. The current study indicates that EF differentiation begins to emerge at preschool age in children with intellectual disabilities. Understanding EF structure in children with intellectual disability will help create better intervention programs for this population.

Identifying predictors of reading speed and reading comprehension in Bosnian.

The goal of the present study was to examine the predictors of reading speed and reading comprehension in third-grade students from Bosnia and Herzegovina (BIH). The sample consisted of 168 third-grade students (86 boys, 82 girls) attending regular schools in Canton Sarajevo, BIH. We examined the effects of phonological awareness (phoneme deletion and rhyming), rapid automatized naming (RAN) of letters and objects, semantic fluency, working memory, and processing speed, on three reading speed tasks and a reading comprehension task. For the reading speed tasks, total amount of explained variance was 33% for reading a text passage, 40% for word reading and 36% for pseudoword reading. The most important predictors of reading speed tasks were phoneme deletion task and RAN: Letters. On the other hand, the model explaining reading comprehension was much less predictive and explained about 11% of variance. Significant predictors of reading comprehension were working memory and processing speed. The results of this study are very informative in creating better models of reading. This in turn will help create better reading intervention programs and potentially reduce the number of children with reading disabilities.