Brain Scans May Predict Reading Difficulties in Children: New Method to Identify Dyslexia

Children who suffer from dyslexia and other reading difficulties are sometimes hard to identify. Now, though, researchers may have found a way to predict reading difficulties earlier, which could, in turn, lead to earlier interventions.

In the United States, children usually learn to read for the first time in kindergarten. They then become proficient readers by the third grade; yet children with reading difficulties can often fall behind and not even be identified until much later.

In this latest study, the researchers examined brain scans of 38 kindergarteners as they were leading to read formally at school. The scientists then tracked the children's white matter development until third grade. White matter is essential for perceiving, thinking and learning.

So what did they find? It turns out that the left hemisphere white matter in the temporo-parietal region just behind and above the left ear in the brain was highly predictive of reading acquisition. In addition, the brain scans improved prediction accuracy by 60 percent compared to tradition assessment alone.

"We show that white matter development during a critical period in a child's life, when they start school and learn to read for the very first time, predicts how well the child ends up reading," said Fumiko Hoeft, senior author of the new study, in a news release. "What was intriguing in this study was that brain development in regions important to reading predicted above and beyond all of these measures."

Early identification and intervention are important for children with reading difficulties. With early action, children won't fall behind their peers in the school system. This latest research shows a way to potentially identify children at risk for dyslexia rather than waiting for them to become poor readers in the first place.

"Examining developmental changes in the brain over a critical period of reading appears to be a unique sensitive measure of variation and may add insight to our understanding of reading development in ways that brain data from one time point, and behavioral and environmental measures, cannot," said Chelsea Myers, lead author of the new study. "The hope is that understanding each child's neurocognitive profiles will help educators provide targeted and personalized education and intervention, particularly in those with special needs."

The findings are published in the journal Psychological Science.