What is dyslexia?
Dyslexia is defined by the British Dyslexia Association as "a combination of abilities and difficulties that affect the learning process in one or more of reading, spelling and writing" although reading is the most prevalent. It has been estimated to occur in 4% of the UK population, and 10% show some of the symptoms of dyslexia. Accompanying weaknesses may be identified in areas of speed of processing, short-term memory, sequencing and organisation, auditory and/or visual perception, spoken language and motor skills. Persons with dyslexia may have difficulty remembering, recognizing, and or reversing written letters, numbers, and words, might read backwards, and they have poor handwriting. The reading disorder is characterised by reading ability below the expected level for a child's age, school grade, and intelligence.
Dyslexia is diagnosed in people of all levels of intelligence and varies in severity and often occurs alongside other specific learning difficulties, such as Dyspraxia or Attention Deficit Disorder. Dyslexia exists in all cultures and across the range of abilities and socio-economic backgrounds. It is not related to intelligence, race or social background. Dyslexia should not be confused with dyscalculia, a learning disability marked by severe difficulties with mathematics. Dyslexia is diagnosed more frequently in boys. Dyslexia can be substantially compensated for with proper therapy, training, and assistive technology. Dyslexia is life-long, but its effects can be minimised by targeted literacy intervention, technological support and adaptations to ways of working and learning.
Many dyslexic people have achieved remarkable success including:
Artists and Writers:
Leonardo da Vinci, Hans Christian Anderson, Lewis Carroll, Walt Disney, Pablo Picasso, Auguste Rodin, Andy Warhol, Beethoven, Mozart, John Lennon, Nigel Kennedy, Agatha Christie
Scientists:
Thomas Edison, Sir Isaac Newton, Michael Faraday, Alexander Graham Bell, Albert Einstein, Wright Brothers
Politicians
George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin Woodrow Wilson, John F Kennedy, Sir Winston Churchill, George Bush, George W Bush, Dwight Eisenhower, Stonewall Jackson
Actors / Performers
Henry Ford, Fred Astaire, Harry Bellafonte, George Burns, Tom Cruise, Whoopi Goldberg, Cher, Susan Hampshire, Oliver Reed, Marlon Brando, Dustin Hoffman, Harrison Ford, Robin Williams, Zoe Wanamaker, Ruby Wax
Sportsmen
Jackie Stewart, Muhammed Ali, Duncan Goodhew, Carl Lewis, Sandy Lyle, Sir Steve Redgrave
Business
Richard Branson, Bill Gates
Miscellaneous
George Patton, Nelson Rockefeller, Steven Spielberg S James Oliver
Dyslexia tends to run in families; it is known that there are several genes that contribute to a genetic risk of dyslexia. It is known to be the result of a brain function disorder. Dyslexia is the most common learning disability in children and persists throughout life. Dyslexia need not be a barrier to achievement and success if it is properly recognized within society, and steps are taken to provide suitable teaching and training along with compensatory strategies and resources.
Dyslexia is best diagnosed by a psychologist who, in addition to other tests, will calculate a person's expected reading age from their intelligence and age. The difference between this and the actual reading age, as measured with a reading test, gives a measure of the reading difficulty. The term dyslexia is usually reserved for a severe degree of reading difficulty. Leonardo da Vinci and Einstein are both thought to have been dyslexic. Psychological assessments can be arranged through your school, or privately through Dyslexia Institutes.
Although dyslexia may be associated with underachievement, many dyslexics prove successful at university and in their careers.
Some people with dyslexia can also suffer with Visual Stress which can be treated much easier than dyslexia itself. Once this element is erased from the equation, the remaining difficulties can be addressed more easily.
| Observation | Year | Abstract |
|---|---|---|
|
Increasing reading speed by using colours:
issues concerning reliability and specificity, and their
theoretical and practical implications. The colour (chromaticity) at which reading was fastest was consistent from one test session to the next. It was different from one individual to another, but highly specific for each individual: departures of colour from optimum by about 6 JNDs eliminated most of the speed advantage conferred by the optimal colour. |
2005 |
Link |
|
Coloured overlays in schools: orthoptic and
optometric findings. Children with visually precipitated symptoms and/or reading difficulties need both a careful evaluation of their accommodative and binocular status, and an investigation of the effect of coloured filters.
|
2002 | Link |
|
The effect of coloured filters on the rate of
reading in an adult student population. Of the subjects who chose an overlay, 38% read more than 5% faster with the overlay and 2% read more than 25% faster. These results are comparable with those obtained for children. We conclude that Meares-Irlen Syndrome is likely to be as common in adults as it is in children.
|
2002 | Link |
|
Tinted spectacles and visually sensitive
migraine. Headache diaries showed that the frequency of headaches was marginally lower when the 'optimal' tint was worn, compared with the 'control'. The trial extends to adults with migraine, the results of a previous double-masked study demonstrating, in children with reading difficulty, beneficial effects of precision tints in reducing symptom frequency.
|
2002 | Link |
|
Randomised controlled trial of the effect of
coloured overlays on the rate of reading of people with
specific learning difficulties. Further analyses support the conclusion that individually prescribed coloured filters can improve reading performance for reasons that cannot be solely attributed to conventional optometric factors or to placebo effects.
|
2002 | Link |
|
A review of the management of 323 consecutive
patients seen in a specific learning difficulties clinic.
More than 70% of those who were prescribed Precision Tints were still wearing them daily, and results for this intervention compared favourably with data for non-tinted spectacles. The data suggest that many people with SpLD need optometric care and that the optometrist needs to be skilled in orthoptic techniques and cognisant of recent research on coloured filters.
|
1999 | Link |
|
Both coloured overlays and coloured lenses
can improve reading fluency, but their optimal
chromaticities differ. The colour of a lens will improve reading only if it is selected under conditions that mimic a change in the colour of a light source: coloured overlays give no clinically reliable guide to optimal lens colour.
|
1999 | Link |
|
Prolonged use of coloured overlays for
classroom reading. The increase in reading speed with the chosen overlay predicted the children who continued to use their overlay during the ensuing eight weeks.
|
1997 | Link |
|
Double-masked placebo-controlled trial of
precision spectral filters in children who use coloured
overlays. Symptoms were less frequent on days when the 'experimental' lenses were worn (P < 0.003).
|
1994 | Link |
|
Irlen filters and reading strategies: effect
of coloured filters on reading achievement, specific reading
strategies, and perception of ability. Assessment of reading four months after the initial screening showed a significant improvement in reading rate and comprehension but not in accuracy. A significant decrease in the number of pauses while reading was also noted for the lens users as well as increases in correlation between word repetition and reading rate and accuracy. The lens users also showed significantly improved scores on a scale of attitude towards school tasks.
|
1994 | Link |
|
The effects of Irlen colored lenses on
students' specific reading skills and their perception of
ability: a 12-month validity study. Assessment of subjects' perception of their own ability (Student's Perception of Ability Scale) 6 and 12 months after the fitting of Irlen lenses indicated a significant improvement in attitude to school and to basic academic skills. Subjects also demonstrated significant improvements in reading comprehension and reading accuracy, but not in rate of reading, when assessed using the Neale Analysis of Reading Ability at 3-, 6-, and 12-month intervals after lens fitting.
|
1990 | Link |
|
Reading disabilities and the effects of
colored filters. Reading performance (rate, accuracy, and comprehension) as measured by the Neale Analysis of Reading Ability (Neale, 1987) and the Formal Reading Inventory (Wiederholt, 1986) improved significantly when the scotopic children read with the preferred colored overlay filter compared to clear or different-colored overlay filters.
|
1990 |