Morpheme‐based Reading and Spelling in Italian Children with Developmental Dyslexia and Dysorthography

Abstract

Italian sixth graders, with and without dyslexia, read pseudowords and low-frequency words that include high-frequency morphemes better than stimuli not including any morpheme. The present study assessed whether morphemes affect (1) younger children, with and without dyslexia; (2) spelling as well as reading; and (3) words with low-frequency morphemes. Two groups of third graders (16 children with dyslexia and dysorthography and 16 age-matched typically developing children) read aloud and spelt to dictation pseudowords and words. Pseudowords included (1) root + suffix in not existing combinations (e.g. lampadista, formed by lampad-, 'lamp', and -ista, '-ist') and (2) orthographic sequences not corresponding to any Italian root or suffix (e.g. livonosto). Words had low frequency and included: (1) root + suffix, both of high frequency (e.g. bestiale, 'beastly'); (2) root + suffix, both of low frequency (e.g. asprigno, 'rather sour'); and (3) simple words (e.g. insulso, 'vapid'). Children with dyslexia and dysorthography were less accurate than typically developing children. Root + suffix pseudowords were read and spelt more accurately than non-morphological pseudowords by both groups. Morphologically complex (root + suffix) words were read and spelt better than simple words. However, task interacted with morphology: reading was not facilitated by low-frequency morphemes. We conclude that children acquiring a transparent orthography exploit morpheme-based reading and spelling to face difficulties in processing long unfamiliar stimuli. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Morpheme-Based Reading and Writing in Spanish Children with Dyslexia

“…HEAL: /hiːl/), even from an early age. In more transparent orthographies, morphological effects have also been reported for children with no difficulties (Finnish: Lehtonen and Bryant, 2005 ; Spanish: Défior et al, 2008 ; Italian: Angelelli et al, 2014 ) and with dyslexia ( Diamanti et al, 2014 ; Angelelli et al, 2017 ). Besides, as for reading, effects look to be modulated by the frequency of the morphological constituents.…”

“…Additionally, the frequency of morphemes was also found to modulate the use of morphology in Italian children with dyslexia-dysorthography and typically developing children. In a study by Angelelli et al (2017) , third grade children had to read three sets of words (1: derived with high frequency morphemes, 2: derived with low frequency morphemes, 3: non-derived) and two sets of pseudowords (1: combining root + suffix, 2: non-derived). They found that morphology facilitated pseudoword reading accuracy in both groups; in addition, both groups took advantage of high frequency morphemes when reading low frequency words, but, surprisingly, children with dyslexia showed worse results in words with low frequency morphemes than in simple ones.…”

Is Morphological Awareness a Relevant Predictor of Reading Fluency and Comprehension? New Evidence From Italian Monolingual and Arabic-Italian Bilingual Children

“…According to these studies, words with a morphological structure (e.g., cass-iere, "cashier") were read faster than simple words (e.g., cammello, "camel") matched for length and frequency. Interestingly, morphological parsing speeded up reading times only in second graders and in children with dyslexia, but not in older skilled children (Burani, 2010;Marcolini et al, 2011;Angelelli, 2010;Angelelli, 2017). The authors concluded that children acquiring a transparent orthography such as Italian exploit morpheme-based reading and spelling to face difficulties in reading long unfamiliar words.…”

The effect of landscape photograph type on aesthetic judgments, attention, and memory in children with dyslexia

“…Also, given the smaller sample size, a word of caution is warranted regarding the reliability of our results. Although our sample size is similar to other previously published studies on children with reading difficulties (e.g.,Angelelli, Marinelli, De Salvatore,& Burani, ; Goodmon etal., ; Heim etal., ; Tafti etal., ; Tong, McBride, Lo,& Shu, ; Wang etal., ), future researchers may include larger samples sizes in order to increase the power needed to find statistically significant differences and improve the reliability of the conclusions.…”