Annals of Dyslexia最新文献

Perceived negative consequences of dyslexia entail the degree to which an individual perceives negative outcomes, such as low academic achievement or feelings of anxiety and depression, and attributes these experiences to the disorder. In the current study, we examined how perceived consequences of dyslexia are influenced by person and environmental factors. Perceived consequences were evaluated for the academic domain and the domain of mental health (depression, anxiety). Participants were 123 Dutch students with dyslexia. Cognitive person factors (literacy skills and verbal IQ), socio-emotional person factors (self-perceived literacy skills and coping ability), and environmental factors (literacy demands, support from the institution, reactions of teachers and peers) were included as predictors. Results indicated that perceived negative consequences were not related to cognitive person factors. In contrast, better self-perceived literacy skills were associated with less perceived negative consequences in all domains (academic, depression, anxiety) and coping contributed to depression consequences. With respect to environmental factors, negative reactions in the academic environment contributed to perceived negative consequences of depression and anxiety. As such, findings indicate that individuals with dyslexia perceive negative consequences in the academic, anxiety, and depression domains which cannot be fully accounted for by their objective reading and writing problems. These factors should feature more prominently in future studies on dyslexia and should be addressed in treatment of dyslexia as well.

Dyslexia is one of the most studied learning disorders. Despite this, its biological basis and main causes are still not fully understood. Electroencephalography (EEG) could be a powerful tool in identifying the underlying mechanisms, but knowledge of the EEG correlates of developmental dyslexia (DD) remains elusive. We aimed to systematically review the evidence on EEG correlates of DD and establish their quality. In July 2021, we carried out an online search of the PubMed and Scopus databases to identify published articles on EEG correlates in children with dyslexia aged 6 to 12 years without comorbidities. We follow the PRISMA guidelines and assess the quality using the Appraisal Tool questionnaire. Our final analysis included 49 studies (14% high quality, 63% medium, 20% low, and 2% very low). Studies differed greatly in methodology, making a summary of their results challenging. However, some points came to light. Even at rest, children with dyslexia and children in the control group exhibited differences in several EEG measures, particularly in theta and alpha frequencies; these frequencies appear to be associated with learning performance. During reading-related tasks, the differences between dyslexic and control children seem more localized in the left temporoparietal sites. The EEG activity of children with dyslexia and children in the control group differed in many aspects, both at rest and during reading-related tasks. Our data are compatible with neuroimaging studies in the same diagnostic group and expand the literature by offering new insights into functional significance.

The current study aimed to investigate whether exposure to spellings would boost memory of meanings and spellings of morphologically complex words, and when spellings are present, whether drawing attention to the morphology of derivative words would activate morphological analysis and therefore enhance word learning. Participants were 36 fourth and fifth graders (20 Spanish speakers, and 16 English speakers) from an elementary school in the Southeastern U.S. students were randomly assigned to one of the two groups: (a) group A, simple spelling exposure group; and (b) group B, drawing attention to morphology group. Each group learned 12 low-frequency morphologically complex words (e.g., odorous) in two orthographic conditions: with the presence of spelling (1) and with the absence of spelling (2). Three learning trials and three test trials were interweaved. After each learning trial, students were prompted to meaning and spelling recall for each target word. Results have extended the evidence of orthographic facilitation effect to morphologically complex words. Students with both higher and lower word reading skills benefitted from spelling presence. Drawing attention to morphology did not enhance the memory of meanings and spellings of morphologically complex words, in comparison to spelling exposure only condition. Implications for vocabulary learning theories and instruction for linguistically diverse students were discussed.

Although the important role of children’s executive function (EF) in their reading development has been well-established, less is known about the extent to which multilingual children’s EF components vary and whether the variability in different EF abilities explains multilingual children’s English reading achievement. The present study explored the US first-grade multilingual children’s (N = 3,819) profiles of EF abilities and how the profile membership was associated with their English reading achievement, using a nationally representative sample of multilingual children from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, Kindergarten Class of 2010–11 (ECLS-K: 2011) study. We fit latent profile analysis with various EF components, including working memory, cognitive flexibility, inhibitory control, approaches to learning, and attentional focus, and found three distinct EF profiles in multilingual children: (a) Below-Average EFs with Above-Average Cognitive Flexibility (10.13%), (b) Above-Average EFs (84.09%), and (c) Very Low Cognitive Flexibility (5.78%). Controlling for kindergarten English reading achievement scores and demographic variables, children in the Above-Average EFs profile attained a significantly higher English reading achievement score than their peers, while children in the Very Low Cognitive Flexibility group had the lowest English reading achievement score. Our findings highlight the importance of understanding multilingual children’s heterogeneity in EF and have implications for the early identification of and tailored intervention for multilingual children at risk for reading difficulties.

Abstract  

Abstract

This study examined whether syntactic awareness was related to reading comprehension difficulties in either first language (L1) Chinese or second language (L2) English, or both, among Hong Kong Chinese-English bilingual children. Parallel L1 and L2 metalinguistic and reading measures, including syntactic word-order, morphological awareness, phonological awareness, vocabulary, word reading, reading comprehension, and cognitive measures of nonverbal intelligence and working memory, were administered to 224 fourth-graders. Five groups of comprehenders were identified using a regression approach: (1) 12 poor in Chinese-only (PC), (2) 18 poor in English-only (PE), (3) six poor in both Chinese and English (PB), (4) 14 average in both Chinese and English (AB), and (5) seven good in both (GB). The results of multivariate analyses of covariance showed that (1) the PB group performed worse than the AB and GB groups in both L1 Chinese and L2 English syntactic awareness; (2) the PC and PE groups performed worse than the AB and GB groups in Chinese syntactic awareness; (3) the PE group had lower performance than the PC, AB, and GB groups in English syntactic awareness; and (4) no significant group difference was found in L2 morphological awareness or vocabulary across both languages. By suggesting that weakness in syntactic awareness can serve as a universal indicator for identifying poor comprehenders in either or both L1 Chinese and L2 English among Hong Kong Chinese-English bilingual children, these findings demonstrate the fundamental role of syntactic awareness in bilingual reading comprehension.

Abstract

The goal of this study was to investigate the contribution of morphological awareness to reading fluency of children with and without dyslexia in a transparent orthography, such as the Greek one. The sample consisted of 256 Greek-speaking children (2^nd grade: 32 dyslexic and 105 typical readers, 5^th grade: 28 dyslexic and 91 typical readers). Morphological awareness was assessed with three tasks, examining inflectional, derivational, and compounding morphology. Reading fluency was evaluated at word, text, and silent level. The results indicated that dyslexic children both in 2^nd and 5^th grade face significant difficulties in inflectional, derivational, and compounding morphology compared to their peers. Hierarchical regression analyses revealed that morphological awareness significantly contributed to reading fluency of children with and without dyslexia, after controlling for non-verbal intelligence, vocabulary, and phonological awareness. Among typical readers, results indicated that inflectional, derivational, and compounding morphology had a small but significant effect on word, text, and silent reading fluency in 2^nd grade and derivational and inflectional morphology on text and silent reading fluency in 5^th grade, after controlling for non-verbal intelligence, vocabulary, and phonological awareness. For dyslexic children, a moderate-to-large effect of inflectional and derivational morphology on text and word reading fluency was restricted to 2^nd grade. Overall, morphological skills may play a supportive role in reading fluency of Greek children in first and last elementary grades. On the other hand, for Greek children facing reading problems morphological skills appeared to have a strong role in reading fluency only in first grades. Our study provided some preliminary data for the dyslexics’ ability of morphological processing as a scaffolding skill for reading fluency. Implications of these findings for education are discussed.

Extensive research has demonstrated the importance of struggling reader identification in monolingual children Compton et al. (Journal of Educational Psychology, 102, 327–340, 2010). However, very few studies have explored identification of struggling readers in bilinguals. The aim of this study was to investigate (1) the overlap of word reading difficulties in English and French, (2) the difference in overlap when word reading fluency skills are included in struggling reader classification, and (3) the stability of English and French word reading profiles. A total of 169 French immersion children were followed from grades 1 to 3. Standardized measures of English and French word reading accuracy and fluency were administered every year to classify status as a bilingual typical reader, bilingual struggling reader, English struggling reader, or French struggling reader. Chi-square analyses were conducted to assess the overlap between English and French word reading difficulties and stability of word reading profiles from grades 1 to 3. Results indicated that struggling reader classification using both word reading accuracy and fluency as opposed to accuracy alone captured bilingual reading difficulties (difficulties in both languages) more accurately. Across all grades, there was a significant relationship between being a struggling reader in English and being a struggling reader in French, with the percentage of overlap ranging from 56 to 82%. Moreover, being a bilingual struggling reader in grade 1 was significantly related to being a bilingual struggling reader in grades 2 and 3. These findings suggest that English-French bilingual children with reading impairments have significant and persistent deficits in both languages.