Integrating Executive Functions: Exploring Interrelations and Implications for Learning in University Students

Executive functions are crucial cognitive abilities enabling individuals to consciously regulate their behavior and cognitive processes. In the university setting, these functions are pivotal for students to engage in executive learning, assessing the effectiveness of their learning behaviors. This research introduces an innovative explanatory model wherein executive functions—such as monitoring responsibilities, supervisory attentional system, conscious behavior regulation, decision-making, emotion regulation, and task-solving management—interact to elucidate the capacity to evaluate learning behaviors. The study encompassed 2465 university students (26.9% Chilean, 28.8% Ecuadorian, and 44.3% Cuban), aged between 17 and 33 years (M = 20.3; SD = ±2.09). The proposed model demonstrated adequate reliability (α = .66 and .83; ω = .66 and .83), correlations (r = .31 and .58), and was assessed using structural equation modeling, yielding favorable fit indices (CFI = .91, RMSEA = .04 [.04 - .05], SRMR = .04). This theoretical framework enhances understanding of executive functions within university contexts, suggesting avenues for future research to intervene in these functions to enhance university students' ability to evaluate their learning behaviors.