Study to unlock keys to dyslexia
The University of Western Sydney is calling for participants for a five year study to help uncover the early signals that indicate whether young children might encounter reading difficulties such as dyslexia.
The UWS MARCS Institute, in conjunction with the University of Cambridge, UK, will examine the development of various speech, language and cognitive abilities of 100 infants from five months through to five years of age.
Using the state of the art facilities at the MARCS Institute BabyLab at the UWS Bankstown campus, the study, funded by an Australian Research Council grant, aims to uncover the various acoustic, speech and cognitive signals that are hidden pointers to a child’s future reading ability.
It is hoped this will then help establish new methods to better detect reading difficulties such as dyslexia, which usually manifest once children start school and learn to read.
Two groups of infants will participate in the study; those at risk for dyslexia by virtue of having at least one dyslexic parent, and those less at risk by virtue of having no dyslexic parents or siblings.
The Seeds of Literacy project is headed by the Director of the UWS MARCS Institute, Professor Denis Burnham, and is being conducted in collaboration with Professor Usha Goswami at the Centre for Neuroscience in Education at the University of Cambridge.
“Reading is one of the most difficult skills we learn, and minor difficulties can have long lasting effects,” says Professor Burnham.
“At the moment many children are not diagnosed with conditions such as dyslexia until they start school and learn to read, simply due to the fact that these conditions are defined by aspects of reading ability. In this project we aim to uncover likely candidates for determining which children will and will not encounter some problems when they learn to read.”
“By investigating the early stages of infant auditory perception and development, we hope to discover more about which factors contribute to the range of reading ability in the early school years. Such results may then be applied to the development of possible intervention measures.”
The MARCS BabyLab at UWS is looking for participants to participate in the study. You may be eligible to take part if:
- You have an infant aged between birth and five months.
- You have an interest in your child’s language and reading development, whether you have a family history of dyslexia or not.
- You and your infant are available to attend the MARCS BabyLab approximately every 3 months (more often in the earlier period) over a period of four and a half years, form five months to five years of age.
Participants will join the ‘Seeds’ Club, receive graded BabyLab degrees for their child, regular ‘Seeds’ newsletters, plus a small gift and $30 for each visit to cover travel expenses.
For further information please email babylab@uws.edu.au or call Rachel Lee on 9772 6313
Ends
6 May 2013
