ArticleCognition & emotion2021
Internalising and externalising in early adolescence predict later executive function, not the other way around: a cross-lagged panel analysis.
Article in Cognition & emotion, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 16 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
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Who cites it
16 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Executive functioning in adolescents with internalizing disorders: a systematic review.European child & adolescent psychiatry · 2026Pooled it
- Associations Among Bullying Victimization, Executive Functions, and Adolescent Internalizing and Externalizing Symptoms: A Random-Intercept Cross-Lagged Panel Model.Journal of adolescence · 2026Article
- Relationship between psychological resilience and internalizing/externalizing behaviors in adolescents: the mediating role of anhedonia and ostracism.BMC psychology · 2026Article
- Examining the association between cognitive ability and emotional problems across childhood using a genetically informative design: could there be a causal relationship?Journal of child psychology and psychiatry, and allied disciplines · 2025Article
- Performance-Based Executive Functions Predict Internalising but Not Externalising Maladaptive Behaviour in Students With ID.Journal of intellectual disability research : JIDR · 2025Article
- Developmental cascades linking executive functions with internalizing and externalizing problems in early childhood through early adolescence.Psychological medicine · 2025Article
- Early predictors of late childhood behavioural outcomes following very preterm birth.Psychological medicine · 2025Article
- Executive Function as an Underlying Mechanism of Alcohol Use, Aggression, and ADHD.medRxiv : the preprint server for health sciences · 2024Article
- The relationship between cognitive and affective control and adolescent mental health.JCPP advances · 2024Article
- Inconsistencies between Subjective Reports of Cognitive Difficulties and Performance on Cognitive Tests are Associated with Elevated Internalising and Externalising Symptoms in Children with Learning-related Problems.Research on child and adolescent psychopathology · 2022Article
- Executive Functioning Constructs in Anxiety, Obsessive-Compulsive, Post-Traumatic Stress, and Related Disorders.Current psychiatry reports · 2022Review
- Socioeconomic status, internalizing and externalizing behaviors, and executive function in adolescence: A longitudinal study with multiple informants.Psychiatry research · 2022Article
- Self-control, Mental Health Problems, and Family Functioning in Adolescence and Young Adulthood: Between-person Differences and Within-person Effects.Journal of youth and adolescence · 2022Article
- Executive Functions and Impulsivity as Transdiagnostic Correlates of Psychopathology in Childhood: A Behavioral Genetic Analysis.Frontiers in human neuroscience · 2022Article
- Associations between executive functioning, challenging behavior, and quality of life in children and adolescents with and without neurodevelopmental conditions.Frontiers in psychology · 2022Article
- Is executive dysfunction a risk marker or consequence of psychopathology? A test of executive function as a prospective predictor and outcome of general psychopathology in the adolescent brain cognitive development study®.Developmental cognitive neuroscience · 2021Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
3 authors.
Funding
Abstract
Developmental changes in the brain networks involved in emotion regulation are thought to contribute to vulnerability to mental health problems during adolescence. Executive control is often viewed as allowing top-down regulation of emotional responses. However, while associations between executive control and mental health are commonly observed in both clinical and non-clinical populations, the direction of these associations remains unclear. Low, or immature, cognitive control could limit emotion regulation. Reversely, high emotionality could impede cognitive functioning. The scarcity of longitudinal studies testing for bi-directional effects, particularly in adolescence, has made it difficult to draw conclusions. This study analysed data from 1,445 participants of a longitudinal cohort in a cross-lagged panel design to understand bi-directional longitudinal associations between executive function and emotional behaviours across adolescence. Executive function was assessed using experimental working memory and inhibitory control tasks, emotional behaviours through parental report of internalising and externalising behaviours. Cross-sectional associations were replicated. Controlling for cross-sectional associations, early executive functions were not found to predict later emotional behaviours. Instead, early emotional behaviours predicted later executive function, with the strongest link observed between early externalising and later working memory. These results suggest that emotional well-being may affect the maturation of executive function during adolescence.
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Registered trials
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