Search

To date little is known about factors that might contribute to positive literacy outcomes in children with (a risk of) reading difficulties (RD). Research into resilience in literacy is needed to understand why some children with (a risk of) RD can overcome their difficulties in the face of adversity. This scoping review aims to 1) provide a framework and operationalize study designs and statistical approaches for studying academic resilience; and 2) systematically review empirical evidence for promotive, protective, and skill-enhancing factors involved in resilience in atypical literacy development of children with (a risk of) word-level RD. The systematic literature search included empirical studies with a focus on compensation in literacy development, including samples of 6- to 16-year-old children with a detectable (risk of) word-level RD. Outcome measures had to include at least one relevant literacy measure. Analysis of the 22 included studies revealed two main findings: 1) most studies had (very) small sample sizes and thus low statistical power to find relevant effects; 2) study designs and/or statistical analyses used were often insufficient to distinguish between promotive, protective, and skill-enhancing factors. Furthermore, findings point towards underrecognition of evidence for promotive and skill-enhancing factors as well as overinterpretation of the same evidence towards protective effects. Overall, empirical evidence for protective factors is sparse and at present based on only a few studies. Based on the current findings, we state implications for the field of educational psychology in planning and conducting research into resilience in literacy. • Literacy research has mostly focused on risk factors and less on resilience. • We conducted a scoping review on resilience and protective factors. • Results show that empirical evidence for protective factors is sparse. • We identified multiple potential cognitive and non-cognitive protective factors. • Future research using sophisticated (statistical) designs is needed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although poor Rapid Automatized Naming (RAN) is a risk factor for reading and/or spelling difficulties (RSD) as well as for mathematical difficulties (MD), many questions surround this relationship. The main objective of the present study was to obtain insight in the relationship between alphanumeric vs. non-alphanumeric RAN and reading/spelling and mathematics in groups of 7-to-10-year-old children with RSD, MD, both RSD + MD, and in typically developing (TD) children. Analyses of variance between the groups showed that the RSD and comorbid (RSD + MD) groups were impaired on both alphanumeric and non-alphanumeric RAN, whereas the MD group was impaired only on non-alphanumeric RAN. Furthermore, non-alphanumeric RAN correlated with all measures except spelling, whereas alphanumeric RAN correlated with the reading and spelling measures only. These findings point towards different/additional cognitive processes needed in non-alphanumeric RAN compared to alphanumeric RAN, which affects the relationship with literacy and math. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]