Characterizing the Overlap Between SLI and Dyslexia in Chinese: The Role of Phonology and Beyond

Abstract

This study examined the overlap of dyslexia and specific language impairment (SLI) in Cantonese-Chinese-speaking children. Thirty children with a prior diagnosis of SLI and 9 normal controls, aged between 6;0 and 11;3, participated. The children with SLI were tested for language impairment and dyslexia. Seven retained a diagnosis of SLI but were dyslexia-free (SLI-only), 13 received a comorbid diagnosis of dyslexia (SLI-D), and SLI had become history (SLI-H) in the other 10 children with no co-morbid diagnoses of dyslexia. The SLI-only group did worse on textual comprehension, but better on left-right reversal (an orthographic skill), than the SLI-D group. The SLI-only and the SLI-D group shared the same range of cognitive deficits relative to age norms and showed no difference in phonological processing. The SLI-D group did worse than the normal group on phonological representation, and both the SLI-only and the SLI-D group had difficulties with morphological awareness.Specific language impairment (SLI) and dyslexia are two common developmental disorders. They are typically diagnosed and treated by different professionals (speech therapists and school psychologists, respectively), and children with SLI are not routinely tested for dyslexia, and vice versa. These disorders are traditionally considered as belonging to two separate clinical populations that frequently share a set of characteristic cognitive difficulties, but to date relatively little is known about their possible overlap (see Bishop

Early predictors of dyslexia in Chinese children: familial history of dyslexia, language delay, and cognitive profiles

“…These results are practically important. They underscore the overlap between language delay and dyslexia found in previous work in Hong Kong (Wong et al, 2010). In addition, they highlight the importance of going beyond phonological sensitivity measures only to diagnose subsequent reading difficulties in Chinese children.…”

“…In Hong Kong, where children generally begin formal instruction in literacy by about the age of 3.5 years, early predictors of dyslexia are particularly important. Wong, Kidd, Ho, and Au (2010) demonstrated that approximately 43% of Hong Kong Chinese children ages 6 to 11 years old with a prior history of early language delays manifested dyslexia, a similar pattern to that found in alphabetic languages. However, that study was retrospective in nature, involving children from a wide‐ranging age group.…”

Phonological Representations and Early Literacy in Chinese

“…Furthermore, isolation points of words (especially from low-density neighborhoods) correlate with measures of reading, nonword reading, and phonological awareness (Boada & Pennington, 2006;Bruno et al, 2007;Metsala, 1997b; but see Griffiths & Snowling, 2001). This difficulty extends to children with specific language impairment, who often have severe reading problems (Dollaghan, 1998;Wong, Kidd, Ho, & Au, 2010).…”

Weaknesses in Semantic, Syntactic and Oral Language Expression Contribute to Reading Difficulties in Chinese Dyslexic Children

“…In addition, morphological awareness, syntactic awareness and verbal memory were also found to be core deficits in Chinese dyslexic individuals (Chik et al , ; Chung, Ho, Chan, Tsang, & Lee, ; Shu, McBride‐Chang, Wu, & Liu, ). In particular, Chinese dyslexic children were observed to share with SLI children a broad range of impairments in language and reading‐related cognitive skills including phonological retrieval, memory and awareness, and morphological awareness (Wong, Kidd, Ho, & Au, ). Given the special semantic and syntactic features in Chinese, it can be expected that dyslexic children will face a big challenge to differentiate subtle word meanings and process syntactic word order in reading tasks.…”