Executive Functioning Among College Students With and Without History of Childhood Maltreatment

ABSTRACT

This study utilized performance-based and self-report measures to examine differences in executive functions in college students with and without histories of childhood maltreatment. On the performance-based measures of executive function, all scores fell within the normal range for age. However, participants in the childhood maltreatment group reported more problems with metacognition than those without history of maltreatment. Severity of childhood maltreatment was associated with poorer cognitive inhibition/switching and phonetic fluency. Although significant group differences were found on a laboratory-based task of executive function, performance across the other tasks was generally similar. However, those with a history of maltreatment reported more problems with metacognition, suggesting a potential avenue for brief interventions focused on improving metacognitive skills important for success in the college environment. Implications and suggestions for future research are discussed.

KEYWORDS:

• Abuse
• behavior
• childhood maltreatment
• cognition
• college
• executive function
• neuropsychology
• young adult

Funding

This study was funded by The Antelo Devereux Award for Young Faculty, Drexel University awarded to Brian P. Daly, Ph.D.

Compliance with ethical standards

All procedures followed were in accordance with the ethical standards of the responsible committee on human experimentation (institutional and national) and with the Helsinki Declaration of 1975, as revised in 2000. Informed consent was obtained from all patients for being included in the study.

Conflict of interest

All authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Additional information

Funding

This study was funded by The Antelo Devereux Award for Young Faculty, Drexel University awarded to Brian P. Daly, Ph.D.