Behaviour, attention and cognition in severe dyslexia

Abstract

Information about coexisting problems in dyslexia may be vital for diagnostic and remedial procedures. There are few studies in this area, and to our knowledge none for the students in focus in this study. They all have phonological deficits and severely impaired reading abilities, in spite of prolonged educational remediation. The aim was to assess if these students have more behavioural/emotional problems than normal reading students. A clinical sample of 70 students, 59 males and 11 females, were compared to a normal reading control group. The groups were pair-wise matched on age, gender, cognitive level, and whether they lived in rural or urban areas. Mean age for the two groups was 150 months, and mean IQ scores approximately 100. Information on behaviour/emotions was obtained from parents, teachers and participants by means of the Child Behavior Checklist, Teacher's Report Form and Youth Self Report. The dyslexia group showed significantly more problems in all areas than the controls. This was reported from all three groups of informants. Parents reported most problems, internalizing behaviour for more than 50% of the participants and total problem behaviour for nearly 45%. Significantly more attention problems were also reported for the dyslexia group from all informants. Parents reported that nearly half the group demonstrated attention problems. Both groups of participants had more problems reported for those with IQ scores of 100 or lower. Further research is needed in this area, but the results clearly indicate that identifying additional behavioural/emotional problems may be imperative for students with severe reading problems.