Eye movements and visual perception in dyslexic children

Abstract

Background

Many research has demonstrated that reading problems, such as dyslexia, can coexist with visual abnormalities. While remediation for phonological impairments in dyslexics is widely acknowledged and practiced, the potential impact of visual deficits, particularly on eye movements and visual perception, is rarely explored.

Objective

This study looks at the performance of eye movements and visual perception abilities in dyslexic children.

Methods

A sample of 20 dyslexic children compared to 20 non-dyslexic age-matched children (aged 7–11). Both groups of the study underwent a video-nystagmography test and visual perception test.

Results

Our study revealed a statistically significant difference between dyslexic and non-dyslexic children in saccade and pursuit tracking tests. There was a statistically significant difference between case and control regarding the visual perception test. Among subgroups of dyslexic children with abnormal eye movements, they displayed visual perception weakness mainly in visual sequencing and discrimination tasks in comparison to dyslexic children with normal eye movements.

Conclusion

The poor oculomotor function affected dyslexic children in their proper control and leads to sluggish visual attention and poor visual perception. According to the major findings of this study, a routine eye examination should be part of the examination of any child with a learning disability.

Keywords:

• Dyslexic children
• oculomotor tests
• visual perception

Acknowledgments

We wish to acknowledge all children and their parents who participated in this study.

Ethical approval

The study was conducted according to the guidelines of the Declaration of Helsinki, and approved by the ethics committee of the Faculty of Medicine Alexandria University was obtained (IRB NO: 00012098).

Informed consent

All the children’s parents were provided with detailed explanations of the research. The parents signed an informed consent form before enrolling their children in the study.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data availability statement

All data generated or analyzed during this study are included in this article. Further inquiries can be directed to the corresponding author.