Ulrika Wolff

Effects of a Randomised Reading Intervention Study: An Application of Structural Equation Modelling

An intensive phonics-based intervention program for nine-year-old Swedish pupils with reading difficulties was performed. Pupils (N = 112) were randomly assigned to either an intervention or a control group. The training was tailored to the Swedish transparent orthography and designed for one-to-one-tutoring during twelve weeks. Previously, reading speed has been shown to be hard to remediate, and one important purpose was to improve reading speed by explicit training. The intervention group showed improvements immediately after intervention in spelling, reading comprehension, reading speed, and phoneme awareness. There were also significant indirect effects from intervention to all variables one year later. Reading comprehension at immediate post-test predicted spelling one year later, and phoneme awareness at post-test predicted both spelling and reading comprehension one year later. The results suggest the importance of a multi-component intervention, even in transparent orthographies, which includes phonics combined with comprehension strategies and fluency training.

Phonological and Surface Subtypes among University Students with Dyslexia

The prevalence of phonological and surface dyslexia subtypes among Swedish university students with dyslexia (n = 40) was examined using both the regression method, developed by Castles and Coltheart, and latent profile analysis. When an academic‐level control group was used as a reference group in a regression, eight students with phonological dyslexia and 15 students with surface dyslexia were identified. In contrast, 17 students with phonological dyslexia and two students with surface dyslexia were identified when the subtypes were defined by reference to a reading‐level control group, indicating a deviant profile among the students with phonological dyslexia and delayed development among those with surface dyslexia. The latent profile analysis was based on five phonological and four orthographic tasks. Seven profiles were obtained, of which none exhibited deficits in orthographic but not in phonological skills or vice versa. Thus, the analysis further supported the phonological deficit hypothesis of dyslexia.

RAN as a predictor of reading skills, and vice versa: results from a randomised reading intervention

Although phonemic awareness is a well-known factor predicting early reading development, there is also evidence that Rapid Automatized Naming (RAN) is an independent factor that contributes to early reading. The aim of this study is to examine phonemic awareness and RAN as predictors of reading speed, reading comprehension and spelling for children with reading difficulties. It also investigates a possible reciprocal relationship between RAN and reading skills, and the possibility of enhancing RAN by intervention. These issues are addressed by examining longitudinal data from a randomised reading intervention study carried out in Sweden for 9-year-old children with reading difficulties (N = 112). The intervention comprised three main elements: training of phonics, reading comprehension strategies and reading speed. The analysis of the data was carried out using structural equation modelling. The results demonstrated that after controlling for autoregressive effects and non-verbal IQ, RAN predicts reading speed whereas phonemic awareness predicts reading comprehension and spelling. RAN was significantly enhanced by training and a reciprocal relationship between reading speed and RAN was found. These findings contribute to support the view that both phonemic awareness and RAN independently influence early phases of reading, and that both are possible to enhance by training.

Cognitive Abilities and Educational Outcomes

General fluid intelligence (Gf) is the ability used in inductive and deductive reasoning, particularly with novel material. It can be contrasted with general crystallized ability (Gc) which reflects schooling and acculturated learning, and the two abilities have different developmental trajectories, with Gf peaking earlier in the lifespan. Gustafsson has made key contributions to our understanding of Gf. He (Gustafsson 1984) introduced hierarchical confirmatory factor analytic models to reconcile Thurstonian (non-hierarchical) and Spearman and Cattell-Horn (hierarchical) models of intelligence and in so doing identified Gf as a second-order factor which perfectly correlated with the third-order factor, general ability (g). This has important implications for understanding the nature of general cognitive skill. Subsequent research showed that Gf can be identified separately from g through variation in culture-related opportunities to learn (Valentin Kvist and Gustafsson 2008). Gf has served both as a predictor (Gustafsson and Balke 1993) and outcome (Cliffordson andGustafsson 2008) in the developmental, cognitive training, cognitive aging, international comparative assessment, genetics, neuropsychopharmacological, human capital theory, and behavioral economics literatures. Understanding the nature offluid intelligence and how to improve it has become a topic of renewed and general interest for optimizing human performance in school and in the workplace.

Effects of a Randomized Reading Intervention Study Aimed at 9-Year-Olds: A 5-Year Follow-up.

The present paper reports on a 5-year follow-up of a randomized reading intervention in grade 3 in Sweden. An intervention group (n = 57) received daily training for 12 weeks in phoneme/grapheme mapping, reading comprehension and reading speed, whereas a control group (n = 55) participated in ordinary classroom activities. The main aim was to investigate if there were remaining effects of the intervention on reading-related skills. Previous analyses showed that the intervention group performed significantly better than the control group on spelling, reading speed, reading comprehension and phoneme awareness at the immediate post-test with sustained effects 1 year later. Results from the 5-year follow-up show that the only significant difference between the intervention (n = 47) and the control group (n = 37) was on word decoding. There was also a significant interaction effect of group assignment and initial word decoding, in the way that the lowest-performing students benefitted the most from the intervention. Another aim was to examine if the children identified in a screening (n = 2212) as poor readers in grade 2 still performed worse than typical readers. The analyses showed that the typically developing students (n = 66) outperformed the students identified as poor readers in grade 2 on working memory, spelling, reading comprehension and word decoding. Copyright