Estudio sobre los procesos de lectura y escritura en alumnado de Educación Primaria y Secundaria con TDAH

Abstract

Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is one of the neurodevelopmental disorders that are most frequently treated in child and adolescent psychiatry departments. In addition to the core symptoms of ADHD, people with this disorder have shown reading and writing difficulties, which have been shown to have a negative impact on their academic achievement and on their general development, both in childhood and in later years. The general aim of this work was to study and to compare the competence in reading and writing of two populations diagnosed with ADHD, one from Primary and the other from Secondary Education, as well as its relationship with the subtype or clinical presentation of this disorder, and the presence of comorbidity. The sample was made up of 111 students, of whom 72 were in primary school (6-11 years old) and 49 were in secondary school (12-17 years old). With reference to gender differences, 81.1% of the participants (n=90) were men and 18.9% (n=21) women. Likewise, 31.5% (n=35) of the students had another comorbid disorder. The EMLE/TALE-2000 Battery (Magellan Scales of Reading and Writing) was used for evaluating reading and writing skills. The test was administered individually and without a time limit, in an isolated room of the ADAHI Association of the Region of Murcia (Southeast Spain) where the participants usually attended therapy. Statistical analyzes were performed using the SPSS 25.0 package. The results showed significant differences between both educational stages in reading and writing skills. Primary school students exhibited a lower performance in the Reading of Pseudowords and Reading of Words 3 tests, a lower number of words per minute, as well as a greater number of spelling and common mistakes in the copy and dictation tests compared to the secondary education group. The handwriting analysis did not present significant differences between both age groups. Concerning the results of the primary education group according to gender, girls showed a worse performance in the reading of pseudowords, and when writing they made more mistakes than boys. Further, elementary school students with ADHD and a comorbid disorder were inferior in reading quality and in reading of pseudowords, but they were better in the use of space and margins in writing. At this age, the hyperactive-impulsive subtype was superior in pseudoword reading, but was inferior in fluency and reading quality, as well as in keeping their writing on the lines. Likewise, the inattentive subtype showed worse performance, in reading comprehension, and the combined one, in the reading and copying phrases tasks. Regarding the secondary education stage, women obtained significantly lower scores than men on several reading tests (Pseudowords, Word Reading 3, and Phrases); however, boys showed worse spelling performance than girls in dictation task. In this stage, the presence of comorbidity was associated with a lower reading speed and a worse outcome in some reading, copying and dictation tests, as well as in the distribution of space on the page in writing. In addition, adolescents of the hyperactive-impulsive subtype made more mistakes in reading of pseudowords and phrases; while writing errors in dictation were lower in the combined subtype. The regression analyzes did not show significant relationships between the reading and writing processes and the gender, comorbidity and clinical presentation variables. The main conclusion is the need to examine and to intervene early and systematically in the area of reading and writing of students with ADHD, given the evidence found on problems related to these activities that are so necessary for school progress