Neural Markers of Dyslexia in Human Development

Abstract: Developmental dyslexia is a heritable learning disorder affecting reading and writing and predisposing to poor academic achievement. It is also associated with deficient language processing, e.g., specific language difficulties. Although infants with a familial background of dyslexia are at an elevated risk to develop the learning disorder compared to infants without dyslexia in the family, it is not known which developmental factors predispose the at-risk infant to develop dyslexia. To target preventive interventions to infants at highest risk for dyslexia, it is paramount to identify these individuals as early as possible. The longitudinal study introduced in this talk aims to inspect neural markers of dyslexia from birth until school age. Furthermore, we employ an early musical intervention during the first six months of life to examine the possible ameliorating effects of music on later language development. I will introduce first results on speech sound processing in healthy sleeping newborns with and without a familial background of dyslexia.

Bio: Anja Thiede obtained her Master’s degree in Brain and Mind at Aalto University, Finland. She is currently a doctoral candidate at the Cognitive Brain Research Unit, University of Helsinki, under the supervision of Prof. Teija Kujala and Dr. Paula Virtala. Her doctoral work aims to examine language processing in the brain, in specific the neural correlates of dyslexia in the developing and adult brain.