Childhood Adversity, Emotion Regulation Difficulties and Executive Functioning in Young Adults: A Neurocognitive Framework and Study Protocol
Year: 2026
Type: article
Study design: Study Protocol
Abstract: Background: Childhood adversity is among the most robust developmental risk factors for emotional difficulties in adulthood. Contemporary neurocognitive accounts propose that early stress becomes biologically embedded through dysregulation of stress-response systems and altered development of prefrontal?limbic circuitry, with downstream consequences for the cognitive control processes (executive functions) on which emotion regulation depends. Few studies have examined adversity, emotion regulation difficulties and executive functioning jointly in non-clinical young adults, particularly in India. Objective: To articulate an integrative neurocognitive framework linking childhood adversity, executive functioning and emotion regulation difficulties, and to present a protocol for testing its psychological-level predictions in young adults. Framework: Drawing on allostatic-load, sensitive-period, threat?deprivation and cognitive-control-of-emotion models, the article derives three testable propositions: that cumulative adversity is positively related to (H1) emotion regulation difficulties and (H2) executive functioning difficulties, and that (H3) these difficulties covary because effortful regulation draws on cognitive control. Methods: A quantitative, cross-sectional, correlational design is proposed. Approximately 50 young adults aged 18?30 years will complete the WHO Adverse Childhood Experiences International Questionnaire (ACE-IQ), the 16-item Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale (DERS-16) and the Adult Executive Functioning Inventory (ADEXI). Associations will be examined with descriptive statistics and Pearson?s correlations. Significance: The article specifies how neurobiological mechanisms are theorised to produce psychological-level associations, clarifies what a self-report, cross-sectional study can and cannot infer about them, and sets out a basis for longitudinal and multi-method research. No neuroimaging or laboratory neuropsychological measures are used, and the neural pathways described are theoretical rather than observed.
Authors: Fiza Farheen, Chethana R Acharya
Institution: Jain University
Language: English
Topic: Child Abuse and Trauma
Subfield: Clinical Psychology
Field: Psychology
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: diamond
OpenAlex ID: W7223470417