Resolving reading disability—Childhood predictors and adult‐age outcomes

Abstract

We examined frequency of adult‐age reading disability (RD) and its childhood predictors among 48 adults (20 to 39 years) with documented childhood RD, and contrasted their cognitive skills, education, and employment with 37 matched controls. Among individuals with childhood RD, more than half had improved in their reading fluency to the level where the set criterion for adult‐age RD was not met anymore. More fluent rapid naming, less severe childhood RD, and multiple support providers in childhood together predicted improvement of reading fluency. More fluent naming differentiated the childhood RD participants whose reading fluency had improved by adult‐age from those participants whose RD persisted to adult‐age. All the individuals with childhood RD performed weaker than the controls in adult‐age working memory, processing speed, and verbal skills. Educational level among both RD groups was lower than that among the controls. Unemployment of individuals with persistent adult‐age RD (31.6%) was higher than that of individuals with improved adult‐age RD (13.8%) or that of the controls (8.1%). According to our findings, rapid naming is one evident factor differentiating individuals with persisted RD from those with ameliorated reading fluency. Also, better adult‐age reading fluency has significance for adult‐age employment among individuals with childhood RD.

Early and late diagnosed dyslexia in secondary school: Performance on literacy skills and cognitive correlates

“…PA forms the basis for the initial stages of literacy learning especially (de Jong & van der Leij, 2003; Papadopoulos, Spanoudis, & Georgiou, 2016), whereas other abilities, for example RAN, contribute to literacy learning throughout development (Manis, Seidenberg, & Doi, 1999; Torgesen, Wagner, Rashotte, Burgess, & Hecht, 1997; Wimmer, 1993). Research into resolving dyslexia has shown that adults with resolved childhood dyslexia display PA performance that is comparable to that of adults with unresolved dyslexia, whereas RAN performance of resolvers resembles that of typical readers (Eloranta, Närhi, Eklund, Ahonen, & Aro, 2018). These findings indicate that while poor PA may hamper literacy development in early stages especially, later problems may occur and remain as a result of deficiencies in other abilities such as RAN.…”

“…The second issue concerns the difference in remediation opportunity between the groups. Early identified students undergo early intervention programs and/or remedial teaching in order to improve reading skills (e.g., Ehrhardt, Huntington, Molino, & Barbaresi, 2013; Eloranta et al, 2018; Tijms, 2011). In contrast, late identified students are less likely to have been offered intervention programs at that time.…”

The Clock Counts – Length Effects in English Dyslexic Readers

“…Given this letter-sound consistency, in transparent orthographies DD is mainly characterized by slow, although accurate reading (Wimmer, 1993; Coltheart and Leahy, 1996; Zoccolotti et al, 1999; Ziegler and Goswami, 2005; Martens and de Jong, 2006). This pattern of difficulties seems to persist in adulthood (Martin et al, 2010; Lindgrén and Laine, 2011; Re et al, 2011; Suárez-Coalla and Cuetos, 2015; Eloranta et al, 2018).…”

“…Developmental dyslexia (DD) is a specific learning disorder characterized by problems with accurate or fluent word recognition, poor letter decoding, and poor spelling abilities, that affects up to 15% of the population worldwide (American Psychiatric Association [APS], 2013). Although most of the research regarding DD has been conducted with children, reading difficulties persist throughout life (Bruck, 1985; Finucci et al, 1985; Nergård-Nilssen and Hulme, 2014; Shrewsbury, 2016; Eloranta et al, 2018).…”

A mobile game as a support tool for children with severe difficulties in reading and spelling

“…Persistent difficulties in reading do not only affect child's performance in classroom but may also lead to lower educational attainment and higher risk for unemployment in adulthood (Eloranta, Närhi, Eklund, Ahonen, & Aro, 2019). Therefore, interventions for prevention of reading difficulties and their negative consequences are of utmost importance.…”