Researchers at Florida State University have won an $8.5 million grant from the National Institutes of Health to help further the understanding and treatment of dyslexia and other learning disabilities, the university announced.
As many as 15 to 20 percent of the population struggle with reading because of a language-based disability, most often dyslexia. A developmental reading disorder, dyslexia affects the brain’s ability to recognize and process symbols, such as numbers and letters.
Those who struggle with reading are less likely to graduate from high school and more likely to be unemployed, according to the National Center for Learning Disabilities.
The five-year grant will allow psychologists and educators at FSU’s Florida Center for Reading Research to continue work they began five years ago through a prior NIH award. That grant funded a learning-disabilities research center, one of just a handful in the country.
Success in life is becoming more and more dependent on one’s ability to read, said Richard Wagner, FSU professor of psychology and a principal investigator on the project. “Now it is difficult to even work at a fast food restaurant if you struggle with reading.”
Among the questions the team is investigating is the role that genes play in learning disabilities. “The genetic susceptibility for dyslexia probably won’t be localized into one or even a handful of genes,” said Wagner, “but by the complex interactions among a large number of genes and areas of the genome that do not appear to contain genes.”
The team is also working on better ways to diagnose the disability sooner, even in children as young as three, which can greatly improve outcomes, he said.
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