Executive functions and intelligence overlap because demanding reasoning requires cognitive control. But executive functions are not one thing, and their relationships with intelligence are unequal.
Attention and intelligence are related because reasoning
Intelligence depends on memory, but there is no single
A light appears. You press a button. The interval can be measured to the millisecond. That apparent simplicity has made reaction time one of the oldest and most powerful tools in experimental psychology.
Name as many animals as you can in one minute. At first, examples may arrive easily: dog, cat, horse, elephant. Then retrieval slows. You may switch to a category—birds, sea animals, farm animals—to generate more.
Two people encounter the same unfamiliar material several times. One reaches accurate recall after relatively little exposure; the other needs more repetitions. Days later, however, their retention may look different again.
You answer a difficult question and feel only 55 percent confident. Instead of submitting immediately, you check your reasoning. On another question, you know that you do not know the answer and decide to look it up.
You need to arrive at an airport by 06:00. That goal alone is not a plan. You must work backward from departure time, estimate travel and security time, decide when to leave, arrange transport, identify dependencies and perhaps prepare alternatives if something goes wrong.
A strategy works repeatedly, and then the problem changes. The old strategy is still available—perhaps even automatic—but continuing to use it now produces the wrong result. Successful performance requires recognizing that the situation has changed and reorganizing what you are doing.
Your phone lights up while you are driving. The notification automatically attracts attention, and checking it is an available response. Not checking requires the current goal—driving safely—to remain more influential than the competing impulse.