Behavioral distractibility in preschoolers from different socio-economic backgrounds

Abstract

AbstractIn children, the ability to listen to relevant auditory information and suppress distracting information is a foundational skill for learning and educational achievement. Distractibility is supported by multiple cognitive components (voluntary attention orienting, sustained attention, distraction, phasic arousal, as well as impulsivity and motor control) that might get mature at different ages. Here we used the Competitive Attention Test (CAT) to measure these components in 71 4- and 5-year-old children. The goal of this study was to characterize the changes in efficiency of attention during the preschool period, and to explore differences in distractibility in preschool children that could be related to the socio-economic status (SES) background of the child’s family. We found that, sustained attention improves from age 4 to 5, while voluntary attention orienting remains stable. Moreover, irrespective of the age, task-irrelevant sounds induced distraction and phasic arousal, as well as increased impulsivity. Children from lower SES backgrounds showed reduced sustained attention abilities, in particular at 4-year-old, and higher impulsivity compared to their peers from higher SES backgrounds. The present findings suggest that multiple distractibility develops during the preschool age and is likely to vary depending on the SES background of a child’s family.