2021/08/20 by Cesare Cornoldi, Carlotta Rivella, Lorena Montesano +1
Mathematics · Psychology · Social Sciences · #Cognitive and developmental aspects of mathematical skills #Mathematics Education and Teaching Techniques #Reading and Literacy Development
paper · doi:10.1177/00222194211037061
crossref issued 2021/08/20 · crossref published 2021/08/20 · crossref published-online 2021/08/20 · openalex publication_date 2021/08/20 · crossref created 2021/08/21 · crossref published-print 2022/07/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · crossref deposited 2026/05/01 · crossref indexed 2026/07/31 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/01
Letters and numbers are different domains, and their differentiation increases with schooling. It has nonetheless been argued that reading alphabetic and numerical materials partly involves the same processes, even in adults. Whether individuals with dyslexia have difficulty reading and writing numbers remains to be established. This study examined this issue in a group of 30 young adults with a diagnosis of dyslexia, without any concurrent specific difficulty in processing quantities, compared with a typically developing group matched for gender, age, university attended and course of studies, and approximate calculation ability. The results showed that adults with dyslexia also have severe difficulty in reading and writing numbers. It emerged that their number reading speed correlated moderately with word reading speed. We concluded that dyslexia is specifically related with difficulties in reading and writing not only alphabetic material but also numerical material. Our findings suggest that these abilities should be considered more carefully when assessing and supporting individuals with dyslexia.