Self-regulation refers to the volitional control of attention, behaviour, and executive functions for the purposes of goal-directed action. Many studies have shown that it is beneficial to help a child develop self-regulation abilities starting from infancy as its impacts last all the way into adulthood.
THE ABILITY TO SELF-REGULATE AFFECTS CHILDREN INTO THEIR ADULTHOOD
Self-regulation refers to the intentional control of attention, behaviour, and executive functions for the purposes of goal-directed action. Blair, C., & Ursache, A. (2011). A bidirectional model of executive functions and self-regulation. In Vohs, K., & Baumeister, R. (Eds.), Handbook of self-regulation: Research, theory, and applications (2nd ed., pp. 300–320). New York, NY: Guilford Press. (Level III) Baron, A., Evangelou, M., Malmberg, L., & Melendez‐Torres, G. J. (2017). The Tools of the Mind curriculum for improving self‐regulation in early childhood: a systematic review. Campbell Systematic Reviews, 13(1), 1–77. https://doi.org/10.4073/csr.2017.10 (Level I)
Children with robust self-regulation skills participated more cooperatively in classroom activities, Fisher, K. R., Hirsh-Pasek, K., Newcombe, N., & Golinkoff, R. M. (2013). Taking shape: Supporting preschoolers’ acquisition of geometric knowledge through guided play. Child Development, 84(6), 1872–1878. https://doi.org/10.1111/cdev.12091 (Level IV) Ramani, G. (2012). Influence of a Playful, Child-Directed Context on Preschool Children's Peer Cooperation. Merrill-Palmer Quarterly, 58(2), 159-190. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/23098461 Feng, X., Shaw, D. S., Kovacs, M., Lane, T., O’Rourke, F. E., & Alarcon, J. H. (2008). Emotion regulation in preschoolers: The roles of behavioural inhibition, maternal affective behaviour, and maternal depression. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 49(2), 132–41. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1469-7610.2007.01828.x (Level IV) Ponitz, C. C., McClelland, M. M., Matthews, J. S., & Morrison, F. J. (2009). A structured observation of behavioural self-regulation and its contribution to kindergarten outcomes. Developmental Psychology, 45(3), 605–619, https://doi.org/10.1037/a0015365
When children are able to control their own responses and emotions and wait for what they want (delayed gratification), they have better attention spans, control their emotions more effectively, plan and learn better, and function more effectively in any environment. Duckworth, A., & Gross, J. J. (2014). Self-Control and Grit: Related but Separable Determinants of Success. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 23(5), 319–325. https://doi.org/10.1177/0963721414541462 (Level III) Mischel W. (2014). The Marshmallow Test: Mastering self-control. New York, NY: Little, Brown, and Company. (Level III - Book)
In a series of longitudinal studies on self-regulation, 500 children of faculty and graduate students at Stanford University completed a delay-of-gratification task at the age of 4 years old. The experiments were held at Stanford’s Bing Nursery School.
The studies found that the significance and predictive validity of delay ability in preschoolers for social, cognitive and mental health outcomes in later life have been demonstrated in a variety of domains. For example, the number of seconds preschoolers waited to obtain a preferred but delayed treat in this diagnostic laboratory situation predicted significantly higher SAT scores and better social cognitive and emotional coping when the children became adolescents. Mischel, W., Shoda, Y., & Peake, P. K. (1988). The nature of adolescent competencies predicted by preschool delay of gratification. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 54(4), 687–696. https://doi.org/10.1037//0022-3514.54.4.687 Shoda, Y., Mischel, W., Peake, P. K. (1990). Predicting adolescent cognitive and self-regulatory competencies from preschool delay of gratification: identifying diagnostic conditions. Developmental Psychology, 26(6), 978–986. (Level IV)
In follow-up studies, preschool delay ability continued to predict later outcomes in adulthood including higher educational achievement, a higher sense of self-worth, better ability to cope with stress and less drug use, particularly in individuals vulnerable to psychosocial maladjustment.
Other studies have also found that the ability to self-regulate at a young age had effects on children’s functioning levels up to adulthood (age 40 and beyond). Baron, A., Evangelou, M., Malmberg, L., & Melendez‐Torres, G. J. (2017). The Tools of the Mind curriculum for improving self‐regulation in early childhood: a systematic review. Campbell Systematic Reviews, 13(1), 1–77. https://doi.org/10.4073/csr.2017.10 (Level I) Poulton, R. , Moffitt, T. E., & Silva, P. A. (2015). The Dunedin Multidisciplinary Health and Development Study: Overview of the first 40 years, with an eye to the future. Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology, 50(5),679-693. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00127-015-1048-8 (Level I) Casey, B. J., Somerville, L. H., Gotlib, I. H., Ayduk, O., Franklin, N. T., Askren, M. K., Jonides, J., Berman, M. G., Wilson, N. L., Teslovich, T., Glover, G., Zayas, V., Mischel, W., & Shoda, Y. (2011). Behavioral and neural correlates of delay of gratification 40 years later. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 108(36), 14998–15003. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1108561108 (Level III)
The Dunedin Multidisciplinary Health and Developmental Study in New Zealand following more than 1000 participants from birth to 32 years found that self-control in childhood is more important than socioeconomic status (SES) or IQ in predicting adults’ physical health, wealth, life satisfaction, addiction, crime, and parenting of the next generation.
Conversely, poor self-regulatory skills at age 3 predicted a wide array of adverse adult outcomes including higher rates of incarceration, poorer physical health, higher unemployment rates, and mental health difficulties.
Other studies have also demonstrated that lower levels of self-regulation skills have also been associated with
- Flouri, E., Midouhas, E., & Joshi, H. (2014). Family poverty and trajectories of children’s emotional and behavioural problems: The moderating roles of self-regulation and verbal cognitive ability. Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology, 42(6), 1043–1056. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10802-013-9848-3 (Level IV)
- Tough, P. (2012). How children succeed. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. (Level III –book)
- Kim, S., Nordling, J., Yoon, J., & Kochanska, G. (2014). Effortful control in “hot” and “cool” tasks differentially predicts children’s behaviour problems and academic performance. Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology, 41(1), 43–56. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10802-012-9661-4 (Level IV)