Is executive control related to working memory capacity and fluid intelligence?

Rey-Mermet, Alodie; Gade, Miriam; Souza, Alessandra S.; von Bastian, Claudia C.; Oberauer, Klaus · 2019 · OpenAlex-citations

DOI: 10.1037/xge0000593

archive: archived pipeline: cataloged verified

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Summary

This study investigates whether executive control constitutes a coherent psychometric construct and whether it is related to working memory capacity (WMC) and fluid intelligence ($g_F$). Previous research has yielded mixed results regarding these relationships, potentially due to difficulties in establishing executive control as a latent variable and a methodological mismatch: executive control is typically measured via reaction times (RTs), while WMC and $g_F$ are measured via accuracy. To address this, the authors tested whether measuring executive control through accuracy—specifically, accuracy within a limited time window—would reveal a coherent construct and stronger correlations with WMC and $g_F$. The researchers recruited 181 university students and administered a battery of tasks. Executive control was assessed using seven inhibition tasks (e.g., color Stroop, number Stroop, flanker tasks, Simon task, antisaccade, and stop-signal task). To ensure executive control was measured on the same scale as WMC and $g_F$, the authors employed a novel calibration procedure. For most tasks, they individually adjusted a response deadline to achieve a fixed accuracy level (75%) on neutral trials. This method mapped individual differences in executive control onto accuracy scores, thereby neutralizing speed-accuracy tradeoffs and general processing speed confounds. WMC was measured using four tasks (updating and complex span), and $g_F$ was measured using five reasoning tasks. Structural equation modeling was used to analyze the relationships between these constructs. The results failed to support the hypothesis that executive control is a coherent latent variable. Despite good reliabilities for individual measures, structural equation modeling identified no coherent factor of executive control. Furthermore, WMC and $g_F$, modeled as distinct but correlated factors, were unrelated to the individual measures of executive control. The findings indicate that measuring executive control through accuracy did not overcome the difficulties in establishing it as a psychometric construct. These results challenge the existence of executive control as a unified psychometric construct and question the assumption that WMC and $g_F$ are closely related to the ability to control ongoing thoughts and actions. The study suggests that previous correlations between executive control and other cognitive abilities may have been driven by methodological artifacts, such as the confounding of executive control with general processing speed or mismatches in measurement scales, rather than a substantive underlying relationship.

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Topics

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• cognitive capacity variation
• executive function
• working memory