Developmental Dyslexia

Previous research has shown the importance of font type, size and spacing to facilitate text reading in dyslexia. A special automatized procedure was designed to select the most favorable parameters for both text visualization and text-to-speech (TTS) conversion to be used by students with reading difficulties. The validation of its outcomes will be carried out through a systematic comparison of the use of the personalized versus standard fonts and voices in reading and writing tests.

The project represents the completion of a part of the recently concluded European project MultiMind, in which a computer platform called MuLiMi was developed and validated. The platform hosts screening tests for the identification of the risk of Language and Learning Disorders in preschool and primary school children, respectively. The aim is to validate the Dynamic Assessment (DA) tests (a first test assessing the capacity to learn new words for preschool children and a second one assessing the capacity to learn a new spelling code for school-age children) in a population of monolingual and bilingual children attending preschool and primary school. The main goal of the study is to complete the validation of the two Dynamic Assessment tests implemented in the MuLiMi platform developed for the MultiMind project.

The present study grounds on the absence of evidence-based treatment in individuals with developmental dyslexia (DD). At this topic, the present study will explore the potential effect of transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) over left hemispheric direct Lateral Geniculate Nucleus (LGN)-V5/MT pathway, cerebral areas usually disrupted in individuals with DD. The investigators hypothesized that active tDCS over V5/MT will boost reading skills in children and adolescents with DD. On the contrary, sham (placebo condition) tDCS over V5/MT or active (control condition) tDCS over V1 will not have significant effect in improving reading skills. Further, both active and sham tDCS will be safe and well tolerated.