ReviewTrends in cognitive sciences2026
Adaptive habits: understanding executive function and its development.
Review in Trends in cognitive sciences, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 3 papers.
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Who cites it
3 citing papers in PubMed.
- Childhood Material Hardship Linked to Adolescent Neurocognition: A Computational Modeling Approach.Developmental science · 2026Article
- Reply to Mazzaferro et al. and Niebaum: The limits of alignment: Grounding executive functions without assuming special contexts.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026Article
- Standard EF tasks can still have predictive validity within diverse cultural contexts.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026Article
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Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
Abstract
Executive functions (EFs) develop dramatically across childhood and predict important outcomes, including academic achievement. These links are often attributed to individual differences in EF capacities. However, individual difference accounts underemphasize contextual influences on EF. We propose a complementary perspective, the adaptive habits framework, which emphasizes how contextual factors support or hinder EF engagement in children. Contexts that support repeated EF engagement establish habits for engaging EF in similar contexts and in similar ways. Such habits, in turn, reduce the effort associated with engaging EF and thus increase the likelihood of deciding to engage EF in the future. We interpret empirical findings through the lens of adaptive habits, discuss the implications of this framework, and propose novel research approaches and interventions to support EF in children.
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