Aging causes changes that affect functioning of cognitive processes such as cognitive flexibility (CF). Given it allows changing both behavior and thinking in dynamic contexts, it constitutes an essential trait of adaptive, goal-oriented behavior. Despite its importance, specific techniques to evaluate CF in older adults are lacking. The goal of this article is to describe and comparatively analyze the functioning of CF in a sample of 169 individuals representing three age groups—younger-age, middle-age and advanced-age adults—by obtaining evidence of internal and external validity. Using a correlational and cross-sectional research design, four studies were conducted in order to evaluate construct validity—fulfillment of experimental paradigm criteria and contrast between groups and tests with different methods. In addition to the Fingers Task, the study used the CAMBIOS Cognitive Flexibility Test, TAC’s Conjunction Visual Search Task (which evaluates perceptual inhibition) and a verbal fluency task with changes. The results provide evidence of the functioning of CF in adulthood and advanced age, which has implications for neurocognitive clinical evaluation in these stages of life. Additionally, evidence was obtained in favor of the concurrent validity of the instruments used to measure CF, contributing to the solidity of future studies on this executive function.

La atención selectiva es la función cognitiva que orienta la atención hacia los objetos o estímulos que resultan relevantes evitando la distracción frente a aquellos que son irrelevantes. En general la literatura indica que el desempeño de la atención selectiva mejora notablemente con la edad, sin embargo, las diferencias vinculadas a esta variable no se cumplen para todas las condiciones de cantidad de estímulos distractores ni para todos los grupos de edad. Asimismo, aun no se ha explorado la contribución del control inhibitorio y la velocidad de procesamiento a esta mejora progresiva. Por este motivo, y debido a la escasez de estudios en población infantil, se propuso analizar la contribución relativa de la velocidad de procesamiento y de la inhibición al desempeño en una tarea de atención selectiva y búsqueda visual en esta etapa evolutiva. Para ello, se administró una tarea de búsqueda de conjunciones y una tarea simple de velocidad de respuesta a 295 niños de 6 a 13 años de edad. Los resultados permitieron plantear dos conclusiones principales: por un lado, que la atención selectiva mejora consistentemente durante la niñez y, por otro lado, que no existe un mecanismo general y exclusivo capaz de explicar estas diferencias durante esta etapa vital. Así, tanto la velocidad de procesamiento como el control inhibitorio contribuyen al desarrollo de la atención selectiva y ambos mecanismos cognitivos actúan de manera complementaria más que excluyente.

Inhibition is one of the main executive functions, because of its fundamental role in cognitive and social development. Given the importance of reliable and computerized measurements to assessment inhibitory performance, this research intends to analyze the internal and external criteria of validity of a computerized conjunction search task, to evaluate the role of perceptual inhibition. A sample of 41 children (21 females and 20 males), aged between 6 and 11 years old (M = 8.49, SD = 1.47), intentionally selected from a private management school of Mar del Plata (Argentina), middle socio-economic level were assessed. The Conjunction Search Task from the TAC Battery, Coding and Symbol Search tasks from Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children were used. Overall, results allow us to confirm that the perceptual inhibition task form TAC presents solid rates of internal and external validity that make a valid measurement instrument of this process.

The Emotion Regulation Questionnaire (ERQ) is a self-report measure designed to assess the two most widely studied strategies of Gross' model: cognitive reappraisal and expressive suppression. Even though there are two Spanish adaptations of the ERQ, region-specific linguistic factors and dialects must also be considered when adapting a test for another country in order to ensure equivalent evaluations across cultures. The present work developed an Argentinean adaptation of the ERQ. Additionally, the study evaluated its psychometric properties and associations with theoretically related constructs. Study 1 consist of the translation the ERQ into Argentinean Spanish and the analysis of its internal structure and reliability in a sample of 2957 participants. The results supported a two-factor structure with good data fit, adequate factor loadings, and good test-retest reliability and internal consistency. Expected age and gender differences in the use of reappraisal and suppression were also observed. Study 2 analyzed the external validity (concurrent and convergent) of the ERQ adaptation in a sample of 2160 participants. Theory-consistent associations were found with emotion regulation mechanisms, anxiety, depression, and personality traits. In summary, the findings support the validity of a new ERQ adaptation and its use in Argentina.