Cross-National Comparisons of Developmental Dyslexia in Italy and the United States
Abstract
This study was designed to examine whether the phonetic regularity of a language can significantly influence the prevalence and pattern of developmental dyslexia. Demographically matched samples of fifth-grade children in Italy (N = 448) and the United States (N = 1,278) were evaluated to identify children with specific reading disabilities. Reading disabled children with average intelligence were compared to normal controls on a series of neuropsychological tests to evaluate specific cognitive deficits associated with reading disorders in each country. The findings suggested that (a) dyslexia is more prevalent in the United States than in Italy, (b) reading disabilities are strongly associated with disorders of verbal processing in both countries, although some American dyslexics also show visual-motor deficits, and (c) there is a greater dissociation between reading comprehension and decoding in Italian than in English.
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Lindgren, De Renzi and Richman (1985) found prevalences varying between 4.5% to 12% in the United States and 3.6% to 8.5% in Italy, attributed to differences in orthographic transparency.
“Lindgren, De Renzi and Richman (1985) compared three definitions on American and Italian students samples, and found prevalences varying between 4.5% to 12% in the United-States and 3.6% to 8.5% in Italy, the difference being attributed to differences in orthographic transparency.”
From Epidemiology of reading disability: A comparison of DSM-5 and ICD-11 criteria (2022) · cites this paper as Lindgren, De Renzi and Richman (1985)
The authors' results are consistent with the suggestion that high-IQ children are at much lower, not higher, risk of dyslexia.
“Finally, our results are consistent with [23], in suggesting that high-IQ children are at much lower, not higher, risk of dyslexia.”
From Epidemiology of reading disability: A comparison of DSM-5 and ICD-11 criteria (2022) · cites this paper as [23]
Studies that revealed cross-language transfer of morphological skills support Cummins's Interdependence Hypothesis, while findings of non-transfer of morphological awareness from English to other languages with shallow orthographies support the Script Dependent Hypothesis.
“In summary, studies that revealed cross-language transfer of morphological skills support Cummins's IH (1979,1981), while findings of non-transfer of morphological awareness from English to other languages with shallow orthographies support the SDH (Liberman et al., 1974;Lindgren et al., 1985).”
From Cognitive Retroactive Transfer (CRT) of Language Skills among Trilingual Arabic-Hebrew and English Learners (2014) · cites this paper as Lindgren et al., 1985
There was no transfer of orthographic skills from English L3 to either Arabic L1 or Hebrew L2.
“In conclusion, the findings indicate that there was no transfer of orthographic skills from English L3 to either Arabic L1 or Hebrew L2, which supports the Script Dependent Hypothesis (Liberman et al., 1974;Lindgren et al., 1985).”
From Cognitive Retroactive Transfer (CRT) of Language Skills among Trilingual Arabic-Hebrew and English Learners (2014) · cites this paper as Lindgren et al., 1985
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Dyslexia: Cultural Diversity and Biological Unity
Paulesu, E., Démonet, J.-F., Fazio, F., McCrory, E., Chanoine, V., Brunswick, N., Cappa, S. F., Cossu, G., Habib, M., Frith, C. D., et al. (2001) · Science · doi:10.1126/science.1057179 · Cited by 1,173 · see citing works
Abu-Rabia, S., & Siegel, L. S. (2002) · Journal of Psycholinguistic Research · doi:10.1023/a:1021221206119 · Cited by 250 · see citing works
Reading, syntactic, and working memory skills of bilingual Portuguese-English Canadian children
Da Fontoura, H. A., & Siegel, L. S. (1995) · Reading and Writing · doi:10.1007/bf01026951 · Cited by 234 · see citing works
Socioemotional features and resilience in Italian university students with and without dyslexia
Ghisi, M., Bottesi, G., Re, A. M., Cerea, S., & Mammarella, I. C. (2016) · Frontiers in Psychology · doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2016.00478 · Cited by 98 · see citing works
Epidemiology of reading disability: A comparison of DSM-5 and ICD-11 criteria
Di Folco, C., Guez, A., Peyre, H., & Ramus, F. (2022) · Scientific Studies of Reading · doi:10.1080/10888438.2021.1998067 · Cited by 64 · see citing works
Abu-Rabia, S., & Shakkour, W. (2014) · Open Journal of Modern Linguistics · doi:10.4236/ojml.2014.41001 · Cited by 26 · see citing works
“Previous findings have demonstrated that syntactic awareness skills are language-specific, supporting the SDH (Liberman et al., 1974; Lindgren et al., 1985).”
BackgroundResultInfluential
- Authors
- Lindgren, S. D., de Renzi, E., & Richman, L. C.
- ORCID
- Lindgren, Scott D.
- Venue
- Child Development
- Publisher
- Oxford University Press (OUP)
- Published
- 1985-12
- Volume
- 56
- Issue
- 6
- Pages
- 1404
- ISSN
- 0009-3920 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W1969836206
- Cited by
- 219
- References
- 0
- Citations by year
- 2026: 2 · 2025: 3 · 2024: 5 · 2023: 9 · 2022: 21 · 2021: 6 · 2020: 7 · 2019: 8 · 2018: 10 · 2017: 6 · 2016: 9 · 2015: 9 · 2014: 9 · 2013: 10 · 2012: 12
- FWCI
- 1.29
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Child Development (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Funders
- National Institute of Mental Health (MH 32802)
- Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (HD 15026)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Developmental and Educational Psychology › Reading and Literacy Development
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Neuropsychology and Physiological Psychology › Developmental and Educational Neuropsychology
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Developmental and Educational Psychology › Language Development and Disorders
- Keywords
- developmental dyslexia, cross-national comparison, reading disorders, prevalence, reading comprehension, decoding, Italian language, English language, fifth grade students
- MeSH terms
- Child, Cross-Sectional Studies, Cross-Cultural Comparison, Dyslexia, Humans, Italy, Language, Phonetics, United States
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