Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society

Previous research has shown a link between sequentiallearning (SL) and language as well as links between executivefunction (EF) and both language and SL. However, littleresearch has focused on both the development of therelationship between these factors and their neurologicalunderpinnings. Here we report a study of the event-relatedpotential (ERP) correlates of SL and behavioral measures oflanguage and EF in a sample of 7-12-year-old children.Results revealed that both SL and EF had independentassociations with language development but that thecontribution that both made toward language developmentshifted dramatically between the ages of 7 to 11-12 years. Theresults furthermore suggest that this developmental shift maybe due in part to the maturation of EF abilities and changesdue to neural entrenchment and commitment as aconsequence of language acquisition.