Language‐related differences between discrepancy‐defined and non‐discrepancy‐defined poor readers: a longitudinal study of dyslexia in New Zealand

Abstract

Language-related differences between discrepancy-defined and non-discrepancy-defined poor readers were examined in a three-year longitudinal study that began at school entry. The discrepancy-defined (dyslexic) poor readers (n=19) were identified in terms of poor reading comprehension and average or above average listening comprehension performance, and the non-discrepancy-defined (non-dyslexic) poor readers (n=19) in terms of both poor reading and listening comprehension performance. The two poor reader groups and a group of normally developing readers (n=55) were given several oral language, phonological processing, and reading performance measures at six testing occasions. Results indicated that in addition to expected differences on the oral language measures, the non-discrepancy-defined poor readers also showed greater phonological processing deficits than the dyslexic poor readers. The results are discussed in terms of the lack of official recognition of dyslexia in New Zealand, the whole language orientation of classroom reading instruction, and the inadequacy of Reading Recovery for minimizing reading problems.

Recent developments in reading intervention research: Introduction to the special issue

“…In support of this claim, Tunmer and Chapman (2007) found in a longitudinal study of language-related differences between mixed disabled readers and dyslexic poor readers that in addition to expected differences on oral language measures, the mixed disabled readers also showed consistently greater phonological processing deficits than the dyslexic poor readers across a range of phonological processing measures (see Snowling, Gallagher, & Frith, 2003, for similar findings).…”

“…These children, who are also called ''garden variety'' poor readers (Gough & Tunmer, 1986), have more widespread language impairments than are typically found among children with dyslexia (Catts & Kamhi, 2005;Tunmer & Chapman, 2007). In addition to phonological processing deficits, children with mixed reading disability have impairments in vocabulary, morphology, syntax, and/or discourse-level processing.…”

Effects of listening ability on speaking, writing and reading skills of children who were suspected of auditory processing difficulty

“…According to the study of Weinberg et al [24], the performance of good readers was not affected by listening also. Generally, the difficulty in reading is based on the factors such as dyslexia, deficits in the development of phonological representations and IQ [6,[25][26][27][28].…”

Oral language predictors for the at-risk reader: A review

“…Recently, Tunmer and Chapman (2007) provided empirical evidence arguing against the premise of the discrepancy definition when they tracked phonological processing, language and reading skills for 91 children over the first three years of formal schooling. Poor readers selected on the basis of being discrepancy-defined or non discrepancy-defined, all had phonological processing deficits.…”

“…Links between many aspects of oral language and reading achievement have been well established for some time (Bradley & Bryant, 1983;Catts et al, 1999Catts et al, , 2002Fletcher et al, 1994;Georgiou, Parilla, & Kirby, 2006;Goswami & Bryant, 1990;Stuart, 2005;Tunmer & Chapman, 2007;Vellutino, Scanlon, Small, & Tanzman, 1991). Further, it has been demonstrated that oral language capacity prior to school entry, substantially contributes towards predicting reading achievement once formal instruction commences (Boudreau & Hedberg, 1999;Catts et al, 1999Catts et al, , 2002Paul, 2007;Justice, Invernizzi, & Meier, 2002;Snowling, Bishop, & Stothard, 2000;Vellutino et al, 1991).…”