Language Skills in Children with Adhd and Developmental Dyslexia

Background. Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) and specific learning difficulties (dyslexia) belong to the most frequently diagnosed developmental disorders in school-age children, and not infrequently cooccur. Linguistic functioning is one of the aspects of cognitive functioning in the cases of ADHA, dyslexia, or both disorders that presents a very diverse symptomatology. The aim of our interdisciplinary research, conducted on 259 children, was to determine whether or not children diagnosed with ADHD and developmental dyslexia differ in the level of linguistic functioning from their peers who are only hyperactive or have isolated developmental dyslexia. Material and methods. The experimental group consisted of 62 children diagnosed with both ADHD and dyslexia. This group was compared with two other clinical groups: children with ADHD and children with dyslexia, and to a control group of pupils without any diagnosed deficits, matched to the experimental group in terms of age. We used the Controlled Oral Word Association Test (COWAT), the Phonological-Semantic Interference Test, and the Token Test – 36, in order to analyze cognitive functioning. Results. Our results indicated that children from all three clinical groups showed a lower level of linguistic competence than the control group. ADHD children had the most difficulties with tasks measuring verbal fluency and comprehension of complex linguistic utterances. The dyslexic group had difficulties mainly with the phonological aspect of language. In the case of cooccurrence of both disorders, cognitive functions deficits are deeper, which must affect school performance. LANGUAGE SKILLS IN CHILDREN WITH ADHD AND DEVELOPMENTAL DYSLEXIA