Evaluating Willingness to Pay as a Measure of the Impact of Dyslexia in Adults

Abstract

While much is known about dyslexia in school-age children and adolescents, less is known about its effects on quality of life in adults. Using data from the Connecticut Longitudinal Study we provide the first estimates of the monetary value of improving reading, speaking, and cognitive skills to dyslexic and nondyslexic adults. Using a stated-preference survey, we find that dyslexic and nondyslexic individuals value improvements in their skills in reading speed, reading aloud, pronunciation, memory, and information retrieval at about the same rate.Because dyslexics have lower self-reported levels on these skills, their total willingness to pay to achieve a high level of skill is substantially greater than for non-dyslexics. However, dyslexic individuals' willingness to pay (averaging $3000for an improvement in all skills simultaneously) is small compared with the difference in earnings between dyslexic and non-dyslexic adults. We estimate that dyslexic individuals earn 15 percent less per year (about $8000) than non-dyslexic individuals. Although improvements in reading, speaking and cognitive skills in adulthood are unlikely to eliminate the earnings difference that reflects differences in educational attainment and other factors, stated-preference estimates of the value of cognitive skills may substantially underestimate the value derived from effects on lifetime earnings and health.

The Yale Outcome Study: Outcomes for Graduates with and without Dyslexia

“…One respondent explained, "In my own experience with my disability, [it is] very localized in terms of what it affects." A minority (44%) of respondents with dyslexia stated that they would prefer not to be dyslexic, providing reasons such as difficulties with learning a foreign language, recalling names and numbers, and reading quickly, findings which are consonant with results of our recent report (Herrera-Araujo et al 2017) showing that dyslexic adults were willing to pay much more than typical readers to read aloud better.…”

Family History Is Not Useful in Screening Children for Dyslexia

“…Both of these definitions validly identify children as dyslexic, and there is little evidence of differences between subgroups of children formed with one criterion versus the other (Shaywitz et al, 1992c). This operational definition has been used by us in many previous peer-reviewed publications (Estrada et al, 2018;Ferrer et al, 2015;Herrera-Araujo et al, 2017) (S. E. Shaywitz et al, 2003).…”

Power Analysis for Two-Level Multisite Randomized Cost-Effectiveness Trials

“…There are various ways to define κ . For example, Herrera-Araujo et al (2017) used a state-preference survey to estimate adult’s WTP to improve reading and speaking skills among dyslexic individuals to be approximately US$3,000. Note that INMB could also be used for CBA with the assumption of κ = 1 .…”