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AbstractTests of attentional control, working memory, and planning were administered to compare the non‐verbal executive control performance of healthy children from different socioeconomic backgrounds. In addition, mediations of several sociodemographic variables, identified in the literature as part of the experience of child poverty, between socioeconomic status and cognitive performance were assessed. Results show: (1) significant differences in performance between groups in most dependent variables analyzed – however, not in all variables associated with attentional control domains; (2) significant indirect effects of literacy activities on working memory and fluid processing domains, as well as computer resources effects on fluid processing; and (3) marginal indirect effects of computer resources on attentional control and working memory domains. These findings extend analysis of the impact of poverty on the development of executive control, through information based on the assessment of combined neurocognitive paradigms and the identification of specific environmental mediators.

"Different ways of solving planning and spatial working memory tasks generate different taskperformance profiles. Tests were administered to 346 (planning) and 427 (spatial working memory) Argentinean children from different socioeconomic (SES) backgrounds. A cross-sectional design was performed to explore eventual variable profiles of performance that were associated with levels of success or failure on tasks that tapped working memory and planning demands and to evaluate their association with SES backgrounds. The results showed that (1) different task-performance profiles were identified: decreased, changeless, oscillated, or increased; (2) the total score for the tasks was significantly different among these profiles; and (3) there were significant differences in the total score among SES groups, which depended on type of profile. These findings suggested the importance of studying individual differences in the performance of tasks that demand self-regulatory processes of children with SES disadvantages. This is important for the understanding of how children solve problems, and how that behavior varies according to SES." (author's abstract)