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Relationship between reading/writing skills and cognitive abilities among Japanese primary-school children: normal readers versus poor readers (dyslexics)

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Abstract

Four hundred and ninety-five Japanese primary-school children aged from 8 (Grade-2) to 12 (Grade-6) were tested for their abilities to read/write in Hiragana, Katakana, and Kanji, for their size of vocabulary and for other cognitive abilities including arithmetic, visuo-spatial and phonological processing. Percentages of the children whose reading/writing scores fell below the −1.5SD cut-off differ according to the scripts—Hiragana: 0.2% for reading and 1.6% for writing, Katakana: 1.4% and 3.8%, and Kanji: 6.9% and 6%, respectively. Further, for the normal children, the older the age, the better they performed on cognitive tasks, while the reading/writing disability (RWD) group (below −1.5SD) showed a weaker relationship between the age and the performance level. It was also revealed that for the normal children, the “vocabulary size” was the most potent predictor variable in accounting for Kanji word reading performance for all grades except Grade-6, for whom nonword reading/repetition were also significant predictor variables. In contrast, for Kanji word writing, generally other writing related variables were better predictor variables. The RWD group however showed different patterns of results. Thus the data from the normal and RWD children in the current cohort were discussed in terms of the current theories of reading, and developmental dyslexia.

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Notes

  1. We are grateful to one of the reviewers who drew our attention to Siegel and Smythe (2005) in terms of gender difference in the incidence of reading disability/dyslexia.

  2. In Japan a common core curriculum is used during the first 9 years of compulsory education (primary and junior high schools). The Ministry of Education and Science in Japan prescribes 1945 Kanji characters/words that children learn during the compulsory education across Japan. This Ministry also prescribes which Kanji characters must be taught at each grade at primary schools in Japan. Further, there are at least two kinds of Kanji characters—pictographs and compound characters. A compound Kanji character has a phonetic radical and a semantic radical. However, primary school children are not made aware of this yet. This is partly because the consistency or congruency between the pronunciation of a phonetic radical and the pronunciation of the whole character containing that phonetic radical is very limited (approximately 30% and only applies to the ON reading; see Kaiho 1983).

  3. One of the reviewers rightly pointed out that cross-linguistic comparisons of the incidence of dyslexia are problematic, since they depend not only on the tests but also on the particular cut-off used. However, one of the main purposes of the study was not to compare directly the incidence of dyslexia across different languages. Rather, it was to establish a general picture of Kanji and Kana reading/writing disabilities among Japanese primary school children using a standardized test (which was developed and based on the results from individually testing over 1,000 Japanese primary school children) and a −1.5 SD cut-off.

  4. Kunishi et al. (International Journal of Pediatric Otorhinolaryngology (2007) 71, 1671–1679) demonstrated that the SCTAW was useful as an abstract lexical evaluation of hearing impaired children.

Abbreviations

RCPM:

Raven’s Coloured Progressive Matrices

SCTAW:

The Standardised Comprehension Test of Abstract Words

STRAW:

Screening Test of Reading and Writing for Japanese Primary School Children

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Acknowledgements

The research reported in the article was made possible by Grant 12610163 from the Japan Society for Promoting Science to Akira Uno and Taeko N. Wydell. The data presented, the statements made, and the views expressed are solely the responsibility of the authors. We are indebted to the children, their parents, and the staff at the state-run primary school in Japan, where the data were collected, for their understanding and participation to this study. We are also grateful to John Richardson (Open University, UK) for his invaluable advice on the statistical analyses.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Graduate School of Comprehensive Human Sciences, University of Tsukuba, 1-1-1, Tennohdai, Tsukuba, Ibaraki, 305-8577, Japan

    Akira Uno

  2. School of Social Sciences, Brunel University, Uxbridge, Middlesex, UB8 3PH, UK

    Taeko N. Wydell

  3. Faculty of Health Science, Mejiro University, 320, Ukiya, Iwatsuki-ku, Saitama-shi, Saitama, 339-8501, Japan

    Noriko Haruhara

  4. Faculty of Medical Science for Health, Teikyo Heisei University, 2-51-4, Higashi-Ikebukuro, Toshima-ku, Tokyo, 170-8445, Japan

    Masato Kaneko

  5. Department of Rehabilitation Medicine, Kawakita Central Hospital, 1-7-3, Asagaya-Kita, Suginami-ku, Tokyo, 166-8588, Japan

    Naoko Shinya

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  1. Akira Uno
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Correspondence to Taeko N. Wydell.

Appendix 1

Appendix 1

Examples of stimuli for Kanji dictation

For grade 2 and 3

For grade 6

右(right)

男(boy)

束(bunch)

卒業(graduation)

雨(rain)

町(town)

粉(powder)

完全(perfect)

青(blue)

学校(school)

芽(bud)

努力(effort)

赤(red)

先蔟(teacher)

梅(plum)

山脈(mountain range)

空(sky)

出口(exit)

鏡(mirror)

反省(conscience)

左(left)

正月(New year)

種(seed)

風景(landscape)

糸(thread)

火山(volcano)

巣(nest)

健康(health)

耳(ear)

天気(weather)

孫(grandchild)

目標(target)

車(wheel)

夕立(shower)

仲間(group)

歴史(history)

草(grass)

日本(Japan)

機会(opportunity)

散歩(a walk)

figure a

Examples of SCTAW pictures

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Uno, A., Wydell, T.N., Haruhara, N. et al. Relationship between reading/writing skills and cognitive abilities among Japanese primary-school children: normal readers versus poor readers (dyslexics). Read Writ 22, 755–789 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11145-008-9128-8

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