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Longitudinal stability of pre-reading skill profiles of kindergarten children: implications for early screening and theories of reading - PubMed

Multicenter Study

. 2017 Sep;20(5):10.1111/desc.12471.

doi: 10.1111/desc.12471. Epub 2016 Oct 17.

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Multicenter Study

Longitudinal stability of pre-reading skill profiles of kindergarten children: implications for early screening and theories of reading

Ola Ozernov-Palchik et al. Dev Sci. 2017 Sep.

Abstract

Research suggests that early identification of developmental dyslexia is important for mitigating the negative effects of dyslexia, including reduced educational attainment and increased socioemotional difficulties. The strongest pre-literacy predictors of dyslexia are rapid automatized naming (RAN), phonological awareness (PA), letter knowledge, and verbal short-term memory. The relationship among these constructs has been debated, and several theories have emerged to explain the unique role of each in reading ability/disability. Furthermore, the stability of identification of risk based on these measures varies widely across studies, due in part to the different cut-offs employed to designate risk. We applied a latent profile analysis technique with a diverse sample of 1215 kindergarten and pre-kindergarten students from 20 schools, to investigate whether PA, RAN, letter knowledge, and verbal short-term memory measures differentiated between homogenous profiles of performance on these measures. Six profiles of performance emerged from the data: average performers, below average performers, high performers, PA risk, RAN risk, and double-deficit risk (both PA and RAN). A latent class regression model was employed to investigate the longitudinal stability of these groups in a representative subset of children (n = 95) nearly two years later, at the end of 1st grade. Profile membership in the spring semester of pre-kindergarten or fall semester of kindergarten was significantly predictive of later reading performance, with the specific patterns of performance on the different constructs remaining stable across the years. There was a higher frequency of PA and RAN deficits in children from lower socioeconomic status (SES) backgrounds. There was no evidence for the IQ-achievement discrepancy criterion traditionally used to diagnose dyslexia. Our results support the feasibility of early identification of dyslexia risk and point to the heterogeneity of risk profiles. These findings carry important implications for improving outcomes for children with dyslexia, based on more targeted interventions.

© 2016 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

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Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1

Latent Profile analysis model for the Identification of Reading Subgroups: Optimal Solution. Raw scores were transformed to Z-scores on all variables. PA-phonological awareness, VSTM-verbal short-term memory, RAN-rapid automatized naming, LSK-letter sound knowledg

Figure 2
Figure 2

Latent class regression predicting reading outcomes from the earlier formed kindergarten latent profiles. The values in the figure are z-scores. The Wald z-statistic suggested that all variables were significant in differentiating between latent classes. That is, for all variables there were differential levels of performance per class. PA-phonological awareness, VSTM-verbal short-term memory, WA- word attack, PDE-phonemic decoding efficiency, SWE-sight word efficiency, WID-word identification, SPELL-spelling, RAN-rapid automatized naming, PS-processing speed.

Figure 3
Figure 3

Latent class distribution across SES groups.

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