Article
Neurosciences
Aleksi J. Sihvonen, Paula Virtala, Anja Thiede, Marja Laasonen, Teija Kujala
Summary: This study utilized a hodological approach to investigate the relationships between structural white matter connectivity and reading skills and phonological processing. The findings revealed specific brain regions associated with reading skills and phonological processing, as well as structural connectivity anomalies in dyslexics.
Article
Psychology, Developmental
Rachel R. Romeo, Tyler K. Perrachione, Halie A. Olson, Kelly K. Halverson, John D. E. Gabrieli, Joanna A. Christodoulou
Summary: Childhood socioeconomic status strongly predicts disparities in reading development, and it is unknown whether early environments also moderate the cognitive and neurobiological bases of reading disorders. The study found that different socioeconomic statuses have different moderating effects on the neurocognitive systems underlying reading disorders.
DEVELOPMENTAL COGNITIVE NEUROSCIENCE
(2022)
Review
Neurosciences
Katarina Stekic, Olivera Ilic, Vanja Kovic, Andrej M. M. Savic
Summary: Phonological awareness refers to the ability to recognize and manipulate phonological structures, which has been found to be closely related to phonological processing and reading ability. This study systematically reviewed 40 papers using ERP methodology and identified ERP components that can predict early developmental dyslexia and reading disorders in children. It also discussed the neurocognitive development of phonological processing throughout childhood and identified phonological tasks that can predict the development of phonological awareness before reading skills emerge. Neurocognitive measures of early phonological processing provide additional diagnostic information beyond behavioral measures of reading abilities.
Article
Psychology, Multidisciplinary
Elsayed E. A. Hassanein, Evelyn S. Johnson, Sayed Ibrahim, Yousef Alshaboul
Summary: Efficient and accurate word reading ability is crucial for reading success. The study examined the roles of phonological processing, morphological processing, and orthographic processing in word reading in Arabic. The findings showed that the contribution of these processes varied based on the method used to test word reading and the student's grade level. Phonological processing, orthographic processing, and morphological processing were found to significantly predict word reading accuracy and fluency. The results have implications for future research and practice in promoting effective word reading skills.
FRONTIERS IN PSYCHOLOGY
(2023)
Article
Neurosciences
Kanad Mandke, Sheila Flanagan, Annabel Macfarlane, Fiona Gabrielczyk, Angela Wilson, Joachim Gross, Usha Goswami
Summary: This study aimed to investigate whether children with dyslexia exhibit typical entrainment to linguistic information at specific time scales. The results showed significant group differences between children with dyslexia and control children in terms of stress and syllable-level information, as well as phoneme-level information. Furthermore, dyslexic children exhibited reduced global network efficiency, which was correlated with their oral language development.
Article
Multidisciplinary Sciences
Teija Kujala, Aleksi J. Sihvonen, Anja Thiede, Peter Palo-oja, Paula Virtala, Jussi Numminen, Marja Laasonen
Summary: Research found abnormalities in grey matter volume and cortical thickness in brain areas such as the left insula, superior temporal gyrus, putamen, etc. in adult individuals with developmental dyslexia, which are related to their reading and phonological skills.
SCIENTIFIC REPORTS
(2021)
Review
Multidisciplinary Sciences
Alice Cancer, Alessandro Antonietti
Summary: Remediation of reading difficulties through music and auditory-based interventions can be effective in children with impairments in reading. The effect of these interventions on reading is inconsistent, but there is a positive impact on phonological abilities.
Article
Neurosciences
Anastasia Klimovich-Gray, Giovanni Di Liberto, Lucia Amoruso, Ander Barrena, Eneko Agirre, Nicola Molinaro
Summary: Early research suggested that individuals with developmental dyslexia utilize contextual information as compensation for phonological deficits, but there is currently no neuro-cognitive evidence to support this. This study used a combination of magnetoencephalography (MEG), neural encoding, and grey matter volume analyses to investigate this issue. The results showed that dyslexic readers had a deficit in speech envelope tracking, and their reading performance was related to semantic compensatory mechanisms in the right hemisphere.
Article
Audiology & Speech-Language Pathology
Wai Ting Siok, Li Hai Tan
Summary: This study examined the cognitive profiles of Chinese primary school students and found that while phonological skills were correlated with character reading performance, they were not the sole factor contributing to poor reading performance in Chinese.
BRAIN AND LANGUAGE
(2022)
Article
Neurosciences
Francesca Borasio, Marie-Louise Syren, Stefano Turolo, Carlo Agostoni, Massimo Molteni, Alessandro Antonietti, Maria Luisa Lorusso
Summary: The present study found associations between PUFA blood levels and reading/writing abilities, as well as neuropsychological test scores. The effects of fatty acids on learning measures appear to be direct, rather than mediated by visual and auditory neuropsychological mechanisms. Visual-spatial attention mechanisms play a crucial role in reading and writing, and visual low-level mechanisms may be more sensitive to the effects of higher omega-3 blood levels.
Article
Clinical Neurology
Daisuke Yamaguchi, Michio Hiratani, Naomi Matsuura, Takashi X. Fujisawa, Shinichiro Takiguchi, Toru Fujioka, Toshihiro Kono, Ikuyo Ishizaka, Akemi Tomoda
Summary: This study compared the reading skills of Japanese students with developmental dyslexia (DD) with borderline IQ (BIQ) and normal IQ (NIQ), and examined the influence of cognitive factors on the reading skills of all students with DD. The results showed that both DD groups had similar performance in hiragana nonword fluency reading, but the DD with NIQ group performed better in hiragana word fluency reading and kanji accuracy reading.
BRAIN & DEVELOPMENT
(2022)
Review
Neurosciences
John Stein
Summary: Most of our knowledge about reading and dyslexia comes from research on developmental dyslexia. There is currently no consensus on how to accurately identify dyslexia, but understanding the specific neural pathways that contribute to reading difficulties can lead to reliable identification methods. Impaired development of the brain's rapid visual and auditory temporal processing systems is a significant factor in dyslexia, causing difficulties with phonological skills.
FRONTIERS IN NEUROSCIENCE
(2022)
Article
Psychology, Educational
Denise Fazio, Livia Ferrari, Silvia Testa, Federica Tamburrelli, Emma Marra, Marta Biancardi, Paola Palladino, Gian Marco Marzocchi
Summary: This study found that students with reading difficulties performed worse in phonological awareness and working memory compared to typically developing students, which are crucial for learning English as a second language. Socio-economic status also plays an important role in second-language learning.
BRITISH JOURNAL OF EDUCATIONAL PSYCHOLOGY
(2021)
Article
Pediatrics
Xiuhong Li, Weidong Li, Buyun Liu, Jinxin Zhang, Jingwen Ma, Chuanbo Xie, Jing Wu, Jin Jing
Summary: The study found that children with DD exhibited lower reading achievement, less eye movement frequency, longer reading time, slower reading speed, and greater number of fixations and saccades compared to children without DD. The impact of articulatory suppression on reading varied depending on the presentation of DD and the type of article.
FRONTIERS IN PEDIATRICS
(2021)
Article
Neurosciences
Aqian Li, Rui Yang, Jing Qu, Jie Dong, Lala Gu, Leilei Mei
Summary: Previous studies have shown that the left prefrontal cortex, bilateral parietal cortex, and occipitotemporal regions are activated during phonological processing of Chinese characters. However, the role of the left middle frontal gyrus in Chinese character reading and whether the core regions for phonological processing in alphabetic languages are also involved in Chinese character reading are still controversial. This study used both univariate and multivariate analysis to investigate neural representations of phonological information during Chinese character reading. The results confirmed the importance of the left middle frontal gyrus and regions in the ventral pathway in representing phonological information of Chinese characters.
HUMAN BRAIN MAPPING
(2022)
Article
Audiology & Speech-Language Pathology
Ben A. M. Maassen, Evelien Krikhaar, Aryan van der Leij, Paula Fikkert
Summary: The aim of this study was to gain more insight into the linguistic characterization of dyslexia by investigating vocabulary acquisition. The results showed that differences in vocabulary development can be considered specific precursors of dyslexia. Vocabulary size and specific linguistic word categories are sensitive indicators of delayed vocabulary development and later reading difficulties.
JOURNAL OF SPEECH LANGUAGE AND HEARING RESEARCH
(2022)
Article
Public, Environmental & Occupational Health
Hekmat Alrouh, Elsje van Bergen, Eveline de Zeeuw, Conor Dolan, Dorret Boomsma
Summary: The study found moderate intergenerational transmission for BMI and EA, significant spousal correlations, and weak cross-trait parent to offspring transmission. There were negative correlations between EA and BMI within individuals, and approximately 60% of the EA-BMI correlation in offspring persisted after accounting for intergenerational transmission.
Review
Audiology & Speech-Language Pathology
Mirjam van Tellingen, Joost Hurkmans, Hayo Terband, Roel Jonkers, Ben Maassen
Summary: This study reviews the use of music-based interventions in the treatment of childhood speech sound disorders (SSDs). Although seven out of eight studies reported positive outcomes, these results are not sufficiently supported by evidence due to insufficient methodological quality. Suggestions for improving methodological quality in future research are presented.
INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF SPEECH-LANGUAGE PATHOLOGY
(2023)
Article
Genetics & Heredity
Catherine Doust, Pierre Fontanillas, Else Eising, Scott D. Gordon, Zhengjun Wang, Gokberk Alagoz, Barbara Molz, Beate St Pourcain, Clyde Francks, Riccardo E. Marioni, Jingjing Zhao, Silvia Paracchini, Joel B. Talcott, Anthony P. Monaco, John F. Stein, Jeffrey R. Gruen, Richard K. Olson, Erik G. Willcutt, John C. DeFries, Bruce F. Pennington, Shelley D. Smith, Margaret J. Wright, Nicholas G. Martin, Adam Auton, Timothy C. Bates, Simon E. Fisher, Michelle Luciano
Summary: This study conducted a genome-wide association analysis on a large sample size and identified 42 significant loci associated with dyslexia, including 15 loci linked to cognitive ability/educational attainment and 27 newly discovered loci potentially specific to dyslexia. The genetic etiology of dyslexia was found to be similar between sexes, and there were genetic correlations with various traits such as ambidexterity. Dyslexia polygenic scores were able to explain a significant portion of variance in reading traits and could contribute to earlier identification and remediation of dyslexia in the future.
Article
Multidisciplinary Sciences
Else Eising, Nazanin Mirza-Schreiber, Eveline L. de Zeeuw, Carol A. Wang, Dongnhu T. Truong, Andrea G. Allegrini, Chin Yang Shapland, Gu Zhu, Karen G. Wigg, Margot L. Gerritse, Barbara Molz, Gokberk Alagoz, Alessandro Gialluisi, Filippo Abbondanza, Kaili Rimfeld, Marjolein van Donkelaar, Zhijie Liao, Philip R. Jansen, Till F. M. Andlauer, Timothy C. Bates, Manon Bernard, Kirsten Blokland, Milene Bonte, Anders D. Borglum, Thomas Bourgeron, Daniel Brandeis, Fabiola Ceronihh, Valeria Csepe, Philip S. Dale, Peter F. de Jong, John C. DeFries, Jean-Francois Demonet, Ditte Demontis, Yu Feng, Scott D. Gordon, Sharon L. Guger, Marianna E. Hayiou-Thomas, Juan A. Hernandez-Cabrera, Jouke-Jan Hottenga, Charles Hulme, Juha Kere, Elizabeth N. Kerr, Tanner Koomar, Karin Landerl, Gabriel T. Leonard, Maureen W. Lovett, Heikki Lyytinen, Nicholas G. Martin, Angela Martinelli, Urs Maurer, Jacob J. Michaelson, Kristina Moll, Anthony P. Monaco, Angela T. Morgan, Markus M. Nothen, Zdenka Pausova, Craig E. Pennell, Bruce F. Pennington, Kaitlyn M. Price, Veera M. Rajagopal, Franck Ramus, Louis Richer, Nuala H. Simpson, Shelley D. Smith, Margaret J. Snowling, John Stein, Lisa J. Struguuu, Joel B. Talcott, Henning Tiemeier, Marc P. van der Schroeff, Ellen Verhoef, Kate E. Watkins, Margaret Wilkinson, Margaret J. Wright, Cathy L. Barr, Dorret Boomsma, Manuel Carreiras, Marie-Christine J. Franken, Jeffrey R. Gruen, Michelle Luciano, Bertram Muller-Myhsok, Dianne F. Newbury, Richard K. Olson, Silvia Paracchini, Tomas Paus, Robert Plomin, Sheena Reilly, Gerd Schulte-Korn, J. Bruce Tomblin, Elsjevan Bergen, Andrew J. O. Whitehouse, Erik G. Willcutt, Beate St Pourcain, Clyde Francks, Simon E. Fisher
Summary: The use of spoken and written language is a fundamental human capacity. Genetic variation influences individual differences in reading- and language-related skills, with a heritability estimate of 30 to 80%. This study conducted a genome-wide association study on samples of 13,633 to 33,959 participants and identified a significant association between a genetic locus and word reading. All five reading-/language-related traits showed robust SNP heritability.
PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
(2022)
Article
Multidisciplinary Sciences
Perline A. Demange, Jouke Jan Hottenga, Abdel Abdellaoui, Espen Moen Eilertsen, Margherita Malanchini, Benjamin W. Domingue, Emma Armstrong-Carter, Eveline L. de Zeeuw, Kaili Rimfeld, Dorret Boomsma, Elsje van Bergen, Gerome Breen, Michel G. Nivard, Rosa Cheesman
Summary: Understanding how parents' cognitive and non-cognitive skills influence their children's educational trajectories is important for educational, family and economic policy. Here, the authors investigate parental influence on children's education using genetic approaches.
NATURE COMMUNICATIONS
(2022)
Article
Pediatrics
Sanne Diepeveen, Hayo Terband, Leenke van Haaften, Anne Marie van de Zande, Charlotte Megens-Huigh, Bert de Swart, Ben Maassen
Summary: The present study identified three subgroups of speech sound disorder in a sample of 150 Dutch children aged 4 to 7 years old. These subgroups differed significantly in terms of intelligibility, receptive vocabulary, and auditory discrimination. However, there were no differences based on age, gender, and SLPs diagnosis.
Article
Psychology, Developmental
Elsje van Bergen, Sara A. Hart, Antti Latvala, Eero Vuoksimaa, Asko Tolvanen, Minna Torppa
Summary: Children who enjoy reading and writing tend to have better literacy skills. Genetic factors play a significant role in both skills and enjoyment, while shared-environmental influences also have an impact. The study suggests that literacy skills influence enjoyment, but not the other way around. Nurturing children's literacy skills is crucial for their development.
DEVELOPMENTAL SCIENCE
(2023)
Article
Education, Special
Camila Martinez, Natasha Maurits, Ben Maassen
Summary: GraphoGame, a computer-based game that trains grapheme-to-phoneme associations, has been shown to benefit reading acquisition. It can help children at risk of reading difficulties, especially in transparent languages such as Spanish. This study examines the effects of using GraphoGame as an intervention tool and a tool for early diagnosis of reading difficulties in children with developmental language disorder (DLD). Results show that all children improved in reading-related skills after six weeks of GraphoGame intervention, but children with DLD and comprehension difficulties made less progress compared to typically developing children.
CHILD LANGUAGE TEACHING & THERAPY
(2023)
Article
Education & Educational Research
Elien Bellon, Elsje van Bergen, Ann Derore Dowker
Summary: Parental mathematics anxiety may influence their children's mathematics anxiety, attitudes, and performance, and maternal educational level has a stronger impact on children's arithmetic scores.
EDUCATION SCIENCES
(2022)
Article
Psychology, Educational
Filippo Abbondanza, Philip S. Dale, Carol A. Wang, Marianna E. Hayiou-Thomas, Umar Toseeb, Tanner S. Koomar, Karen G. Wigg, Yu Feng, Kaitlyn M. Price, Elizabeth N. Kerr, Sharon L. Guger, Maureen W. Lovett, Lisa J. Strug, Elsje van Bergen, Conor V. Dolan, J. Bruce Tomblin, Kristina Moll, Gerd Schulte-Koerne, Nina Neuhoff, Andreas Warnke, Simon E. Fisher, Cathy L. Barr, Jacob J. Michaelson, Dorret I. Boomsma, Margaret J. Snowling, Charles Hulme, Andrew J. O. Whitehouse, Craig E. Pennell, Dianne F. Newbury, John Stein, Joel B. Talcott, Dorothy V. M. Bishop, Silvia Paracchini
Summary: The association between handedness and language-related disorders has been extensively studied. However, the inconsistent findings may be attributed to factors such as small sample sizes, publication bias, and variation in study criteria. This study examined the frequency of non-right-handedness (NRH) in individuals with reading and/or language impairment and found a higher prevalence compared to controls. Meta-analysis results further supported the association between NRH and language/reading impairments, suggesting shared underlying pathways between brain lateralization, handedness, and cognitive functions.
Article
Psychology, Clinical
Thomas H. Kleppesto, Espen Moen Eilertsen, Elsje van Bergen, Hans Fredrik Sunde, Brendan Zietsch, Magnus Nordmo, Nikolai Haahjem Eftedal, Alexandra Havdahl, Eivind Ystrom, Fartein Ask Torvik
Summary: The intergenerational resemblance of ADHD behaviors is primarily due to genetic transmission, with little evidence for parental ADHD behaviors causing children's ADHD behaviors. Individual-specific environmental factors also play a role in the variability of ADHD behaviors.
PSYCHOLOGICAL MEDICINE
(2023)
Article
Multidisciplinary Sciences
Toivo Glatz, Wim Tops, Elisabeth Borleffs, Ulla Richardson, Natasha Maurits, Annemie Desoete, Ben Maassen
Summary: This study evaluates the effectiveness of a digital game-based learning tool for beginning readers of Dutch. Through a randomized controlled trial involving 247 first graders, the study found that the literacy game improved letter knowledge for all children in the classroom. Additionally, children with high phonological awareness were more fluent readers after extensive exposure to the reading game. This study is one of the first to use game-generated data for evaluating digital game-based learning for literacy interventions.
Article
Genetics & Heredity
Hekmat Alrouh, Elsje van Bergen, Conor Dolan, Dorret I. Boomsma
Summary: A study analyzed BMI and EA in 13,916 families in the Netherlands and found significant intergenerational transmission of BMI and EA between parents and their offspring. The parents' BMI was positively correlated with their children's BMI, and EA was positively correlated with academic achievement in adolescents. The spousal correlations and within-person correlations also affected the transmission.
TWIN RESEARCH AND HUMAN GENETICS
(2023)
Article
Education & Educational Research
Sofieke T. Kevenaar, Elsje van Bergen, Albertine J. Oldehinkel, Dorret I. Boomsma, Conor V. Dolan
Summary: Self-control and grit are considered predictors of school performance, but their causal relationship is unclear. A twin design study found that self-control and grit primarily predict school performance through genetic pleiotropy, with a smaller causal effect.
NPJ SCIENCE OF LEARNING
(2023)