The study was published in the Journal of Pediatrics. “Executive work underscores your ability to engage in goal-directed behaviors,” said University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign kinesiology and community health professor Naiman Khan, who worked with graduate student Arden McMath and food science and human nutrition professor Sharon Donovan. Led the study together.
This includes abilities such as inhibitory control, which allow you to control your thoughts, feelings, and behavior; working memory, by which you are able to keep information in mind for a long time to complete a task; and cognitive flexibility, the dexterity with which you switch your attention between tasks or competing demands.
“We wanted to test the hypothesis that healthy weight status and adherence to the AAP guidelines for diet and physical activity would lead to greater executive function in 24-month-olds,” McMath said. Through its Bright Futures initiative, the AAP recommends that children spend less than 60 minutes per day looking at screens, engage in at least 60 minutes of physical activity, consume five or more servings of fruits and vegetables, and Reduce or eliminate the consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages.
McMath said previous studies have linked physical activity levels, screen time and adherence to dietary quality guidelines with executive function in school-aged or adolescent children.
“We focused on earlier periods in child development to see if these relationships begin and how early in life,” she said. New research finds families of 356 children, I of U. participants in the Strong Kids 2 Cohort Study, a long-term look at the interdependent factors that predict dietary habits and weight estimates of children followed from birth. up to the age of 5 years.
The study uses parental surveys and data on children collected at eight time points over five years, including when the children were 24 months old. “The survey asked parents to report on several aspects of their child’s daily habits, including how much screen time they watched, how physically active they were, whether they had at least five servings of fruits and vegetables. and whether they had refrained from drinking sugar-sweetened drinks,” McMath said.
Parents also answered a standard survey designed to measure executive function in toddlers. These questions asked them to evaluate their ability to plan and organize their thoughts, regulate their emotional responses, inhibit impulses, remember information, and transfer attention between tasks.
The team used a structural equation modeling technique to assess direct and indirect relationships between adherence to AAP guidelines and executive function in toddlers.
McMath said, “We found that children who engaged in less than 60 minutes of screen time per day were significantly more likely to actively control their cognition than those who spent more time on phones, tablets, TVs and computers. was more.”
“They had greater inhibitory control, working memory, and overall executive function.” Researchers found that children who got daily physical activity also performed better on tests of working memory.
While the study found no significant association between children’s weight status and executive function, it suggested that “the relationship between health behavior and executive function may precede the relationship between executive function and weight status in older children.” ”, the authors wrote.
“The effect of engaging in healthy behaviors on cognitive abilities is evident in childhood, particularly for behaviors surrounding physical activity and sedentary time,” Khan said.