Lateral and Central Presentation of Words with Limited Exposure Duration as Remedial Training for Reading Disabled Children

Abstract

In two studies it is examined whether lateral presentation of words in remedial practice for reading disabled children has additional effects to central presentation. The effect of limited exposure duration (LED) is also studied as a possible factor in inducing higher level decoding processes or increased processing speed of words. Two groups of Dutch reading disabled children (n1 = 25, mean age = 9;8 years & n2 = 36, mean age = 7;1 years) repeatedly practiced reading words presented in the left, right or the central visual field. The results show that all children improved substantially both in reading speed and accuracy, which demonstrates the importance of repetitive practice in reading to attain fluency in reading disabled children. Further analysis demonstrated that neither site of presentation nor limited exposure duration added significantly to the training results. These findings do not corroborate neuropsychological theories suggesting a special role for lateral presentations. The authors would like to thank Mascha Kaan and Manon van Hensbergen for their valuable contributions in collecting data. We also gratefully acknowledge the effort and cooperation of the children who participated in our experiments, as well as their teachers.