Naming speed (NS) tasks that measure how quickly and accurately participants can name visual stimuli (e.g., letters) are commonly used to predict reading ability. However, the link between NS and reading is poorly understood. Three methods were used to investigate how NS relates to reading and what cognitive processes are involved: (a) changing stimulus composition to emphasize phonological and/or visual aspects (Compton, 2003); (b) decomposing NS times into pause and articulation components; and (c) analyzing eye movements during a NS task. Participants were in three groups: dyslexics (aged 9, 10), chronological-age (CA) controls (age 9, 10), and reading-level (RL) controls (aged 6, 7). We used a letter NS task and three variants that were either phonologically and/or visually confusing while subjects’ eye movements and articulations were recorded, and examined how these manipulations influenced NS performance and eye movements. For all groups, NS manipulations were associated with specific patterns of behaviour and saccadic performance, reflecting differential contributions of NS to reading. RL controls were less efficient, made more errors, saccades and regressions, and made longer fixation durations, articulation times, and pause times than CA controls. Dyslexics consistently scored in between controls, except for the number of saccades and regressions in which they made more than both control groups. Overall there were clear developmental changes in NS performance, NS components, and eye movements in controls from ages 6 to 10 that appear to occur more slowly for dyslexics. Furthermore, pause time and fixation duration were key features in the NS-reading relationship, and increasing visual similarity of the letter matrix had the greatest effect on performance for all subjects. This latter result was demonstrated by the decrease in efficiency and eye-voice span, increase in naming errors, saccades, and regressions, and longer pause times and fixation durations found for all subjects. We conclude that NS is related to reading via fixation durations and pause times; longer fixation durations reflect the greater amount of time needed to acquire visual/orthographic information from stimuli, and longer pause times in children with dyslexia reflect the greater amount of time needed to prepare to respond to stimuli. / Thesis (Master, Neuroscience Studies) -- Queen's University, 2013-09-26 12:24:53.951

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.

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

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Multiple domains of deficit have been proposed to account for the apparent reading failure of children with a reading disability. Deficits in both phonological awareness and rapid automatized naming are consistently linked with the development of a reading disability in young school age children. Less research, however, has sought to connect these two reading related processes to global theories of deficit, such as temporal processing deficits, in the explanation of reading fluency difficulties. This study sought to explore the relationship between aspects of temporal processing, as indexed through measures of motor fluency and control, and measures of reading related processes, phonological awareness and rapid automatized naming, to word reading fluency. Using structural equation modeling, measures of patterned motor movement were found to be negatively and significantly related to measures of phonological awareness. Measures of oral and repetitive movement were found to be positively and significantly related to measures of patterned movement. Finally, phonological awareness was found to be a significant predictor of word reading fluency both independently and through rapid automatized naming. No direct relationship between measures of motor control and fluency and word reading fluency was found. These findings suggest that temporal processing, as indexed by measures of motor fluency and control, are moderately predictive of the facility with which a child with a reading disability can access, manipulate, and reproduce phonetically based information. Implications for the inclusion of motor based measures in the assessment of children with reading disabilities and future directions for research are discussed.

O objetivo dessa pesquisa foi compreender os processos lingüísticos que subjazem à aprendizagem da linguagem escrita, o desenvolvimento de protocolo de análise de redação, assim como a correlação entre esses processos lingüísticos e a produção escrita. Participaram deste estudo 82 alunos de 3ª série do Ensino Fundamental de escolas particulares e municipal, com idades entre nove e dez anos, residentes em municípios da região oeste da Grande São Paulo. Esta pesquisa foi divida em três estudos. No Estudo I foram analisados os desempenhos dos sujeitos em provas de vocabulário, consciência fonológica e nomeação rápida de objetos, cujos resultados se mostraram adequados para a faixa etária estudada. No Estudo II analisamos a produção escrita em ditado de palavras e pseudopalavras e elaboração de uma narrativa escrita. Concluímos que os erros fazem parte do processo de desenvolvimento da escrita, mas é necessário também que se compreendam que estratégias a criança utiliza para escrever. Em relação à redação concluímos que, apesar de ainda não dominarem todo o esquema narrativo, as crianças apresentaram um conhecimento lingüístico que lhes permitiu escrever histórias originais em forma de narrativa. O protocolo proposto se mostrou uma ferramenta prática, que possibilitou uma avaliação minuciosa dos diversos aspectos envolvidos na elaboração da redação. O Estudo III indicou correlações entre o desempenho nas provas de vocabulário, consciência fonológica e nomeação seriada rápida e o desempenho ortográfico, assim como com a produção de uma narrativa escrita. / This research aimed at understanding the linguistic processes involved in the learning of written language, as well as developing a protocol to analyze written text. This study included eighty-two 3rd graders with ages ranging from 9 to 10, from both private and public schools, and residents of the West region of São Paulo and suburbs. Three studies composed this investigation. The first study analyzed student performance on tests of vocabulary knowledge, phonological awareness and rapid naming for objects. All students performed as expected for their age in these tests. The second study focused on the analysis of written production, as evaluated through a word and pseudoword spelling task and a written narrative text. The spelling errors observed in these tests were compatible with the development of written skills of the subjects, however it is necessary to understand which are the spelling-strategies used by the children. Regarding text-writing skills, although the children have not yet mastered the narrative scheme, they displayed enough linguistic knowledge to elaborate original written stories in a narrative form. The proposed protocol was revealed as a practical tool to evaluate in detail several aspects involved in written text production. The third study focused on the correlations among the different performance variables analyzed, including vocabulary, phonological awareness, rapid naming tasks, spelling and production of narrative written texts.

O objetivo dessa pesquisa foi compreender os processos lingüísticos que subjazem à aprendizagem da linguagem escrita, o desenvolvimento de protocolo de análise de redação, assim como a correlação entre esses processos lingüísticos e a produção escrita. Participaram deste estudo 82 alunos de 3ª série do Ensino Fundamental de escolas particulares e municipal, com idades entre nove e dez anos, residentes em municípios da região oeste da Grande São Paulo. Esta pesquisa foi divida em três estudos. No Estudo I foram analisados os desempenhos dos sujeitos em provas de vocabulário, consciência fonológica e nomeação rápida de objetos, cujos resultados se mostraram adequados para a faixa etária estudada. No Estudo II analisamos a produção escrita em ditado de palavras e pseudopalavras e elaboração de uma narrativa escrita. Concluímos que os erros fazem parte do processo de desenvolvimento da escrita, mas é necessário também que se compreendam que estratégias a criança utiliza para escrever. Em relação à redação concluímos que, apesar de ainda não dominarem todo o esquema narrativo, as crianças apresentaram um conhecimento lingüístico que lhes permitiu escrever histórias originais em forma de narrativa. O protocolo proposto se mostrou uma ferramenta prática, que possibilitou uma avaliação minuciosa dos diversos aspectos envolvidos na elaboração da redação. O Estudo III indicou correlações entre o desempenho nas provas de vocabulário, consciência fonológica e nomeação seriada rápida e o desempenho ortográfico, assim como com a produção de uma narrativa escrita. / This research aimed at understanding the linguistic processes involved in the learning of written language, as well as developing a protocol to analyze written text. This study included eighty-two 3rd graders with ages ranging from 9 to 10, from both private and public schools, and residents of the West region of São Paulo and suburbs. Three studies composed this investigation. The first study analyzed student performance on tests of vocabulary knowledge, phonological awareness and rapid naming for objects. All students performed as expected for their age in these tests. The second study focused on the analysis of written production, as evaluated through a word and pseudoword spelling task and a written narrative text. The spelling errors observed in these tests were compatible with the development of written skills of the subjects, however it is necessary to understand which are the spelling-strategies used by the children. Regarding text-writing skills, although the children have not yet mastered the narrative scheme, they displayed enough linguistic knowledge to elaborate original written stories in a narrative form. The proposed protocol was revealed as a practical tool to evaluate in detail several aspects involved in written text production. The third study focused on the correlations among the different performance variables analyzed, including vocabulary, phonological awareness, rapid naming tasks, spelling and production of narrative written texts.

Made available in DSpace on 2016-04-28T20:56:25Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Sandra Puliezi.pdf: 2083109 bytes, checksum: 7554325d5167a5c7ef372db6b8373f0f (MD5) Previous issue date: 2011-09-26 / Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico / The research aimed to evaluate how three phonological processing skills (phonological awareness, phonological working memory and rapid naming) are related to the initial reading ability in a group of children in a first grade of the elementary school. Another objective was to assess whether variations in reading ability (good and poor readers) are related to changes in phonological processing skills. The participants were 28 students in a private school in Guarulhos city. The average age group was 6 years and 7 months. The procedure consisted of individual application tasks: word reading, rhyme and initial phonemes identifying, segmenting words into syllables, digits repetition, pseudo-word repetition and rapid naming of pictures. Data were expressed as points and subjected to statistical tests. The t-Test results, comparing good and poor readers, led us to conclude that good readers read faster than poor readers, and have better results in phonological awareness. In phonological working memory can be said that the difference between good and poor readers was not significant. In rapid naming, there is a significant difference between the groups in favor of good readers. The results of Pearson correlations allow us to conclude that performance in the initial reading is associated with the reading time. We can also say that the initial reading is associated with the three processing skills assessed: phonological awareness, phonological working memory and rapid naming / O objetivo da pesquisa foi avaliar como três habilidades de processamento fonológico (consciência fonológica, memória de trabalho fonológica e velocidade de nomeação) se relacionam com a habilidade inicial de leitura em um grupo de crianças do 1º ano do ensino fundamental. Também foi objetivo verificar se variações na habilidade de leitura (bons e maus leitores) estão relacionadas a variações nas habilidades de processamento fonológico. Participaram do estudo 28 alunos da rede particular de ensino do município de Guarulhos. A idade média no grupo era de 6 anos e 7 meses. O procedimento consistiu na aplicação individual de tarefas de: leitura de palavras, identificação de rima e fonema inicial, segmentação de palavras em sílabas, repetição de dígitos, repetição de pseudo-palavras e nomeação rápida de figuras. Os dados foram expressos em pontos e submetidos a testes estatísticos. Os resultados do Teste-t, comparando os grupos de bons e maus leitores, nos levou a concluir que os bons leitores leem mais rápido que os maus leitores, assim como possuem melhores resultados em consciência fonológica. Na memória de trabalho fonológica podemos dizer que a diferença entre os bons e maus leitores não foi significativa. Na velocidade de nomeação há uma diferença significatica entre os grupos a favor dos bons leitores. Os resultados das correlações de Pearson nos permitem concluir que o desempenho na leitura inicial está associado com o tempo de leitura. Também podemos dizer que a leitura inicial está associada com as três habilidades de processamento avaliadas: consciência fonológica, memória de trabalho fonológica e velocidade de nomeação

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