Focusing Our View of Dyslexia Through a Multifactorial Lens: A Commentary

Abstract

Multifactorial models of dyslexia have expanded how we consider heterogeneity within the population of children with dyslexia. These models are predicated on the idea that cognitive/linguistic risk factors are not deterministic but instead probabilistic, with the likelihood of difficulties involving an interaction between risk and protective factors that include both exogenous and endogenous influences. In this commentary a multifactorial model perspective is applied to examine, based on the six papers that make up the special series, the potential utility of such models to clarify issues of etiology, identification, and instruction of children with dyslexia. This approach seems to suggest that multifactorial models of dyslexia have potential to significantly expand our understanding of etiology with less immediate promise for identification and instruction.