ERIC Number: EJ1103413
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2016-Jul
Pages: 17
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0736-9387
EISSN: N/A
Implicit Learning of Non-Linguistic and Linguistic Regularities in Children with Dyslexia
Nigro, Luciana; Jiménez-Fernández, Gracia; Simpson, Ian C.; Defior, Sylvia
Annals of Dyslexia, v66 n2 p202-218 Jul 2016
One of the hallmarks of dyslexia is the failure to automatise written patterns despite repeated exposure to print. Although many explanations have been proposed to explain this problem, researchers have recently begun to explore the possibility that an underlying implicit learning deficit may play a role in dyslexia. This hypothesis has been investigated through non-linguistic tasks exploring implicit learning in a general domain. In this study, we examined the abilities of children with dyslexia to implicitly acquire positional regularities embedded in both non-linguistic and linguistic stimuli. In experiment 1, 42 children (21 with dyslexia and 21 typically developing) were exposed to rule-governed shape sequences; whereas in experiment 2, a new group of 42 children were exposed to rule-governed letter strings. Implicit learning was assessed in both experiments via a forced-choice task. Experiments 1 and 2 showed a similar pattern of results. ANOVA analyses revealed no significant differences between the dyslexic and the typically developing group, indicating that children with dyslexia are not impaired in the acquisition of simple positional regularities, regardless of the nature of the stimuli. However, within group t-tests suggested that children from the dyslexic group could not transfer the underlying positional rules to novel instances as efficiently as typically developing children.
Descriptors: Dyslexia, Children, Comparative Analysis, Statistical Analysis, Linguistics, Stimuli, Standards, Geometric Concepts, Orthographic Symbols
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Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A