English Word Reading Difficulties and Orthographic Processing Weaknesses in Chinese–English Bilingual Adolescents With Dyslexia

Is dyslexia in Chinese for Chinese–English bilinguals associated with difficulties in reading English, given differences in L1 and L2 orthographies? Among 11 Hong Kong Chinese adolescents with dyslexia, who were diagnosed by professional psychologists using the diagnostic criteria set out in a standardized test, and 14 adolescents without dyslexia, Chinese word reading was tested at the age of 9 years; English word reading was tested across ages 9, 10, 11, and 12 years; and English orthographic processing was tested in a lexical decision task at the age of 13 years. The lexical decision task required participants to judge whether or not stimuli appeared to “look like” a possible real word in English across 3 conditions (real words, look-like words that were orthographically possible in English, and nonwords that violated orthographic rules of English). English word reading differed significantly between the 2 groups in 2 of the 4 years. Both groups found it easier to identify nonwords that violated English orthographic rules than those that did not. However, compared with peers without dyslexia, adolescents with dyslexia had more difficulties with English orthographic rules in accuracy but not reaction time, suggesting that children with dyslexia may manifest specific difficulties in English orthographic processing.