Word-retrieval and rapid naming abilities play an important role in language processing and cognitive development. Researchers have demonstrated that early language difficulties may lead to later reading impairments and several decades of research has convincingly demonstrated that rapid automatized naming is a powerful predictor of concurrent and future reading development. As a result, researchers have argued that naming and reading tasks involve some shared cognitive processes. Language and reading deficits have implications for academic success and self-esteem, particularly during childhood. Hence, the identification of children at-risk for developing reading impairments is an important task for educators and clinicians. Debates still exist about whether rapid naming difficulties reflect simple delays in language acquisition resulting from processing speed and/or attention problems or are suggestive of abnormalities in underlying cognitive processes. While the co-occurrence of rapid naming deficits and reading impairments is well established in the literature, few studies have explored the presence of Dysnomia without reading impairment. The current study examined the nature of expressive language deficits for Dysnomic children with and without impaired reading by incorporating multiple neuropsychological measures. In a sample of children (N=104) between the ages of 6 and 12 years, performance differences were specifically investigated on measures of verbal fluency, confrontation naming, and rapid naming, as well as visual and verbal sequential memory. The impact of a concurrent diagnosis of a primary attention deficit was also examined within the context of cognitive performances. Results of the current study indicated that a concurrent diagnosis of AD/HD significantly impacted performance on measures of verbal fluency and confrontation naming. When comparing the neurocognitive profiles of these children, those with Dysnomia performed significantly better on reading-related tasks and worse on a measure of visual sequential memory. No significant differences were found between groups on other neuropsychological measures, yet performances were consistently below average for children in both groups. Overall, findings revealed that children in both groups displayed similar neurocognitive profiles. However, children diagnosed only with Dysnomia were significantly younger than children with both Dysnomia and Dyslexia. Findings from this study have implications for research and intervention with school-aged children. Treatment approaches targeting reading fluency and automaticity may be particularly helpful for children with Dysnomia, in addition to intervention programs which integrate fluency-based with phonological-based treatment.

This study investigated the differential contribution of auditory-verbal and visuospatial working memory (WM) on decoding skills in second- and fifth-grade children identified with poor decoding. Thirty-two second-grade students and 22 fifth-grade students completed measures that assessed simple and complex auditory-verbal and visuospatial memory, phonological awareness, orthographic knowledge, listening comprehension and verbal and nonverbal intelligence. Bivariate correlations revealed that complex auditory-verbal WM was moderately and significantly correlated to word attack at second grade. The simple auditory-verbal WM measure was moderately and significantly correlated to word identification in fifth grade. The complex visuospatial WM measures were not correlated to word identification or word attack for second-grade students. However, for fifth-grade participants, there was a negative correlation between a complex visuospatial WM measure and word attack and a positive correlation between orthographic knowledge and word identification. Different types of WM measures predicted word identification and word attack ability in second and fifth graders. We wondered whether the processes involved in visuospatial memory (the visuospatial sketchpad) or auditory-verbal memory (the phonological loop), acting alone, would predict decoding skills. They did not. Similarly, the cognitive control abilities related to executive functions (measured by our complex memory tasks), acting alone, did not predict decoding at either grade. The optimal prediction models for each grade involved various combinations of storage, cognitive control, and retrieval processes. Second graders appeared to rely more on the processes involved in auditory-verbal WM when identifying words, while fifth-grade students relied on the visuospatial domains to identify words. For second-grade students, both complex visuospatial and auditory-verbal WM predicted word attack ability, but by fifth grade, only the visual domains predicted word attack. This study has implications for training instruction in reading. It was not the individual contributions of auditory-verbal or visuospatial WM that best predicted reading ability in second and fifth grade decoders, but rather, a combination of factors. Training WM in isolation of other skills does not increase reading ability. In fact, for young students, too much WM storage can interfere with learning to decode.

Pre-literate children experience written text as a meaningless material object, the word-object, but the compulsory and institutional aspects of reading pedagogy make this an experience from which they cannot escape. Some children begin to associate their own negative experiental sense with the word-object before they are able to learn to read. As reading pedagogy continues, these children begin to read back experiental sense which prevents them from converting the word-object to meaningful text. Experiental sense is repressed because it is psychically painful. It retains qualities of phenomena repressed from childhood: it is active and intractable to reason. The result is an intractable illiteracy which may be interpreted as biologically based �dyslexia.� Further attempts at reading pedagogy in childhood and adulthood generally result in reproduction of the inability because this pedagogy requires learners to attempt to read linguistically which elicits experiental sense. As these children become adults, their avoidance of reading sometimes structures their social relations to accommodate and compound their problems. The method to overcome the problem replaces experiental sense with positive feelings about written language. The power of language to denote emotions of pleasure and affirmation from learners� lives is used. These emotions are enhanced through a technique of affirmative intersubjectivity. Short spoken affirmative texts are made by learners, tape recorded and reproduced as written texts by the literacy worker. Through allowing learners control and autonomy over their spoken and written texts, the positive emotions in them are associated by learners with the written texts. Exercises on the affirmative written texts are used to demonstrate regularities about written language. Learners then progress to reading suitable independent texts and other activities. There are suggestions about how to enhance learners� feelings as competent readers and writers. The thesis uses a methodology of action research and includes five case studies of adults with literacy problems. Concepts from social theory, psychoanalysis and object relations theory are used and adapted to understand written language, schooling and illiteracy.

Master of Visual Arts / My MVA work, Alternative Perceptions of Reality: Dyslexia, revolves around dyslexia and ways in which dyslexic artists, like myself, represent reality in their art. I focus on how dyslexics perceive space and time, how this is represented in their work and how it manifests in my own work. The introduction describes why dyslexia is relevant to art, provides more detail on dyslexia itself and ways dyslexia can affect perception. Surrealism and Symbolism are discussed in order to draw parallels with dyslexic perception. Chapter 1 describes the influences on my own work, including dyslexia, primitive art and symbolism. The second chapter profiles two well known artists with dyslexia: Robert Rauschenberg and Pablo Picasso. I examine ways in which they represent space or reality and how dyslexic perception is apparent in their works. Similarly, in Chapter 3, I discuss the works of the contemporary dyslexic artists Terry A. Orchard and Katharine Dowson, including the results of interviews and surveys I conducted. Throughout this dissertation, I also discuss my own experience of dyslexia and how it is expressed through my paintings. In the conclusion, I discuss what I have learned about the work of myself and other dyslexic artists: How our paintings are a glimpse of alternative inner realities.

Converging evidence suggests that phonological awareness is at the core of reading ability. Rapid automatized naming (RAN), defined as how quickly individuals can name continuously presented familiar visual stimuli, is also known to be a strong predictor of reading performance, and reading fluency in particular. The double deficit hypothesis suggests RAN deficits represent an additional core deficit associated with the reading process. Although there are many ways to measure RAN (e.g., using letters, numbers, pictures, objects), not well established is which RAN task is most predictive of the reading fluency skills of clinic referred children. Further research is also needed to understand the relationship between RAN and general processing speed, and the extent to which RAN tasks uniquely predict the reading fluency of clinic-referred children. The purpose of the current study is to determine a) the relationships among phonemic awareness, RAN, general processing speed, and reading fluency; b) the predictive value of phonemic awareness and RAN tasks in determining reading fluency performance; c) which RAN task best predicts reading fluency; and d) if RAN tasks continue to predict reading fluency while controlling for general processing speed. 64 children from a university reading clinic were used as participants in this study. The results suggest that alphanumeric RAN task performance --and letter naming in particular-- are unique contributors to reading fluency performance in dysfluent readers. Further, the results indicate that this contribution to reading fluency extends beyond that of other theoretical components of fluency. / School of Education / School Psychology / PhD / Dissertation

The general aim of this thesis was to examine variations in the word decoding skills of reading disabled children. These variations were related to possible cognitive, developmental, and environmental causes of reading disability. Possible implications for educational interventions were also analysed. The thesis critically examines the inclusion of the concept of intelligence in the definition of developmental dyslexia. It is suggested that variations in word decoding skills should offer a more solid basis for a study of varieties of reading disability. The empirical studies showed that a) in young children there was a shift from phonological to orthographic word decoding; b) phonological type children (weak in phonological decoding) were characterised by specific phonological deficits; c) surface type children (weak in orthographic decoding) showed more global cognitive deficits suggesting a general developmental delay; d) surface type children showed impaired visual implicit memory for words, which might be associated with limited print exposure; e) an improvement in phonological awareness only transferred to an improved text reading ability for some reading disabled children; f) children who did not benefit from a phonological intervention seemed to rely on orthographic word decoding in text reading. Thus, the thesis suggests that variations in phonological and orthographic word decoding skills offer a useful basis for the study of varieties of reading disability and that educational interventions should pay regard to what the child is already attempting to do when reading. / On the day of the defence date the status of article IV was: Manuscript.

The complicated task of deciding whether reading and writing difficulties in a second language learner stem from dyslexia or from problems associated with second language learning serves as the primary theme of this study. The theoretical framwork of dyslexia-related issues is a phonological cause model (Ramus, 2004). Generally, the study is based on psycholinguistically oriented research of reading in a second language (eg. Kulbrandstad, 1998) and dyslexia in second language learners (Frederickson & Frith, 1998; Geva, 2000; Miller Guron & Lundberg, 2003). The overall aim of the study is to contribute to our knowledge of how reading and writing difficulties in bilingual adolescents could be expressed, characterised and delimited, in order to enhance our understanding of how various prerequisites effect literacy development and to facilitate identification and handling of dyslexia in bilinguals. The study is based on data from ten Spanish-Swedish speaking adolescents with reading and writing difficulties. The multiple case study perspective has made it possible to investigate a number of linguistic and cognitive parameters in both languages. Furthermore, comparisons were made with a bilingual group of ten Spanish-Swedish speaking adocelscents without reading and writing difficulties as well as with a group of ten monolingual Spanish and Swedish speaking adolescents with dyslexia. Dyslexia has been defined and delimited in a bilingual dyslexia profiles continuum. This continuum is one of the significant theoretical-methodological contributions of the thesis. Another important contribution is the research design, that is, the use of a bilingual matched comparison group (without reading and writing difficulties) as the norm. Furthermore, quantitative and qualitative analyses have been summarised as various profiles, such as reading profiles, writing profiles and oral discourse profiles. The results are discussed on both group and individual levels and show that language dominance ha a major impact on the manifestations of the reading and writing difficulties. The differences between the two orthographies are also of importance. Furthermore, advantageous results in both languages co-vary with extensive L1 education in the bilingual participants both with and without dyslexia.

This case study examines how upper secondary schools in a municipality in the northern parts of Sweden structure their special pedagogy with students who have ADHD and dyslexia, students’ and parents’ experiences of this, and what regulates the schools management in this particular aspect. The results show that all the schools have special pedagogues and other support staff employed, though in varied extent. Furthermore, the resources are distributed differently from school to school. The focus, however, is always around communication between the concerned parties. Unfortunately, their good efforts to reach all students have not been successful. Not every special needs student have received the support they are entitled to. Students, as well as parents, have pointed out the shortages that they have experienced in communication, support and information about what rights they have, both as special needs students and as just students in a Swedish upper secondary school. Many of our informants have pointed out the teachers’ ignorance as one reason for the disappointment regarding the support from the schools.

The purpose of this paper is to find out if technology within pedagogy can help pupils with dyslexiaperform on the same level as their peers without using compensatory aid. Is it possible to replacethe compensatory aids with the technology in question? Can the same technology also be used tosupport other pupils as well and in turn removing the stigma of needing compensatory aid? To learn the answers to these questions I have done a qualitative text analysis. This analysis focuson technology in the form of podcasts and Web 2.0 based teaching platforms. The analysis alsofocus on pupils with dyslexia and what kind of help compensatory aids can be. The texts will beanalyzed based on the concept of equivalence and Habermas's theory of technology as ideology. The conclusions I have reached is that it is not possible to help all pupils with dyslexia with theseforms of technology. Not in such a manner that the compensatory aid in question can be replaced.This is due to the fact that not every pupil with dyslexia need the same support. The technology dohowever offer aid and shows signs of being able to help the pupils perform.

Recent studies in the field of dyslexia have used magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS) to explore neurochemical manifestations of neurobiological differences in the brains of dyslexic adults compared to controls. This study examines the potential relationship between functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) BOLD (blood oxygen level demand) activation scores in response to cognitive tasks and MRS-measured levels of a metabolite and a neurotransmitter, N-acetylaspartate (NAA) and gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) respectively, in the occipital region of brains of seven-year old children. Preliminary results from this multi-arm, longitudinal study indicate a significant positive correlation between fMRI BOLD signal elicited in response to picture-cues in the occipital region of interest bilaterally, and both GABA (R2=0.477 p=0.05, 2-tailed) and NAA (R2=0.587 p=0.01, 2-tailed) levels. The results suggest that the functional neuroanatomical circuitry involved in a cognitive task also has neurochemical indicators.