Dyslexia and Autism are Opposites - Implications for Creativity, Late-Blooming / Precocity, and Savant Abilities

Structural studies from Michael Casanova and colleagues showed that the brains of dyslexic and autistic subjects had opposite findings. Microcolumns are repeating groups of neurons that share a common dendritic bundle. The microcolumnar hypothesis is the idea that the microcolumn is the basic unit in the cortex, not individual neurons.

"Dyslexia and autism are on opposite tails of the normal distribution of the width of minicolumns...Autistic individuals have increased number of smaller minicolumns and dyslexic children have decreased number of larger minicolumns..." When the depth of gyral depths were measured of dyslexics compared to controls, "mean gyral white matter depth was 3.05 mm (SD ± 0.30 mm) in dyslexic subjects and 1.63 mm (SD ± 0.15 mm) in the controls." Researchers speculated that longer connectivity in the brains of dyslexics could account for "a greater capacity for abstract, 'visionary' thinking", but also slower development (late blooming?) including a slower development of reading. Its information like this that should reinforce the idea that dyslexic children should have a differentiated educational program (fewer inappropriate demands at early ages) - and recognition of high creative potential and capacity for abstraction.

The changes in autism could also account for why some people with autism show extreme precocity with rote tasks, may have unusual gifts of rapid mathematical calculation, and superior abilities with certain tasks of visual discrimination (like Oliver Sack's account of two twins with autism who could rapid determine when 111 matches had fallen to the ground).


Structural differences between dyslexic and autistic brains
Microcolumns figure
Increased gyral depth in dyslexia (abstract only)
Savant numerosity pdf

The Bad, the Good, and Variability of Time Blindness

"Time is more flexible than most of us think." - Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

We know them, we love them, we are them - the time blind are constantly running into trouble for being late or missing assignments, but they also can persist longer than non-blind people at projects or activities (forgetting to eat, sleep, etc.) and achieve things that time-keepers can only dream of.

Who is Time Blind?

Time perception is worse for children than adults, and children diagnosed with ADHD and children diagnosed with specific language impairment, but some variations in time perception occur in healthy people (apparently we are better at perceiving time in the morning compared to the evening...makes sense), and video games like Tetris causes adolescents to lose time (underestimate video game time vs. reading).


Recently there have been a number of research papers providing insight into what causes the perception of time to go awry - many things, it seems, but among them stress (car accidents, catastrophic life events etc.) or distractions, sensory mismatches, and strong positive or negative feelings. Moviemakers recognize the 'when time stood still' phenomena of cataclysmic events - because they slow down the film speed when portraying car accidents, attacks on the battlefield and the like - and that is often what people in crises situation say - everything seemed slowed down or it was like I saw things in slow motion.

What Keeps Time in the Brain?

Competing theories (above) point to either a single site in the brain (for instance the cerebellum, basal ganglia, or dorsal prefrontal cortex) or networks of sensory areas (vision-auditory-somatosensory areas) that dynamically interact with each other. Either idea might explain why some children (and adults of course) are so time-blind. If one system is off (for instance vision) - it throws the whole network 'out-of-sync', explaining why so many different kids (sensory processing, ADHD, speech problems, dyslexia, etc.) struggle with their awareness of time.

Context Matters and Time Blindness

In an interesting landmark study involving 10- and 14-year olds remembering to check a clock to take cupcakes out of the oven in time (they were distracted by playing a videogame while waiting), Ceci and Bronfenbrenner found both groups were better at checking the clock and taking cupcakes out of the oven in the laboratory, when compared to home. Only 1 child failed the task when it was performed in the laboratory, whereas 42% failed when the task was given at home. Reasons for this are open to discussion but might include the special setting of the laboratory, increased distractions at home, etc. The researchers also made the conclusions that the children were more strategic in the laboratory (increased clock checking closer to the time the cupcakes were to come out).

An interesting subsequent study compared young adults to seniors - and found that although young adults were better than older adults if the cupcake / oven test was performed in a laboratory, but interestingly - the performance results were reversed if the experiment were conducted at home. Several ideas have been raised about these results - young adults may have been more familiar with the laboratory conditions, and perhaps the improved results for older adults' time perception at home was the presence of familiar surroundings and familiar supports for remembering and time awareness.

When Time-Blindness is Good --> Flow

But what about the positive side of time blindness? Not uncommon when we're talking to a family about the problems with time blindness in young student, a parent sheepishly admits he or she is also time blind - and that they have to be reminded to eat for instance if they're working on a complex computer project, job, etc. Since Csikszentmihalyi's work with 'flow', additional studies have confirmed that highly intrinsically motivated students check the time less often, are less aware of time, and lose track of time more often when their working on their favored tasks. So there is a positive side of time blindness. Intrinsically-motivated students perceive time as passing more quickly, that's why external commitments slide.

Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi defined 'flow' as an optimal experience that people can move into when they are so completely involved that 'nothing seems to matter', self-consciousness disappears, and the sense of time is distorted. He proposed that had 4 components: control, attention, curiosity, and intrinsic interest.

All this important to keep in mind if young Johnny or Jane is getting in trouble with time-blindness. Some very bright kids struggle in school because they have powerful interest-driven learning styles - they learn a lot of their own choosing, but if a topic doesn't seem important or appeal to them well....Time blindness can be a clue. Another is a learning style - learning environment mismatch like an inductive learner being taught with exclusively deductive methods.

Photos: stopwatch, cupcake

Positive Psychology Hits the Classroom

At the August APA meeting, Seligman reported results from the Positive Psychology Program (PPP) and Penn Resiliency Program based on more than 2000 8 to 15 year old school students.

The positive psychology program taught students how to "identify their signature character strengths (e.g., kindness, courage, wisdom and perseverance)." For example, one exercise in the positive psychology asked students to list 3 good things that happened to them each day for a week - then the follow-up questions asked what the event meant to them and what can increase the likelihood of this happening again (kind of connecting the dots for the students). The resiliency program taught students to " think more realistically and flexibly about the problems they encounter. PRP also teaches assertiveness, creative brainstorming, decision-making, relaxation and other coping and problem-solving skills."

The net result: positive thinking and resiliency training improved students' school outlook and engagement, improved classroom behavior and cooperation, resulted in more self-control, and more empathy. Not bad!

Carol Dweck has a slightly different take on the importance of psychological outlook on student achievement. She has argued for Mindset teaching, In her work (at right), she found that students who believed that intelligence was a fixed entity were more likely to show no improvement in their math achievement from 7th to 8th grade, more likely to withdraw or cheat, and less likely to demonstrate mastery-reactions to setbacks. Not surprisingly, the students who believed intelligence could be 'grown' - were more likely to persevere, show resiliency behaviors to setbacks, and improve performance.

Dweck's conclusions:

"Our analyses showed that the divergence in math grades was mediated by several key variables. First, students with the growth mindset, compared to those with the fixed mindset, were significantly more oriented toward learning goals. Although they cared about their grades, they cared even more about learning. Second, students with the growth mindset showed a far stronger belief in the power of effort. They believed that effort promoted ability and that was effective regardless of your current level of ability. In contrast, those with the fixed mindset believed that effort was necessary only for those who lacked ability and was, to boot, likely to be ineffective for them. Finally, those with the growth mindset showed more mastery-oriented reactions to setbacks, being less likely than those with the fixed mindset to denigrate their ability and more likely to employ positive strategies, such as greater effort and new strategies, rather than negative strategies, such as effort withdrawal and cheating.

Thus, students’ beliefs about their intelligence played a key role in how they fared in math across this challenging school transition. When students believe that their intelligence can increase they orient toward doing just that, displaying an emphasis on learning, effort, and persistence in the face of obstacles."

Dweck also mentions that the importance of setbacks does not emerge until students face real academic setbacks. An important point to keep in mind for students who are struggling. Many psychologists also emphasize the importance of realistic positive thinking rather than unrealistic positive thinking.Presumably realistic thinking involves recognizing the need for effort, perseverance, and external help if needed.

All three approaches - Seligman's approach to positive thinking (e.g. view setbacks as external, temporary, and specific), resiliency training (including problem solving, identifying sources of problems, etc.), and mindset instruction would seem to be valuable for many students.

The relationship between optimism and learning has not really been studied in detail by fMRI, but optimism activates both the amygdala (emotions, not surprising) and the rostral anterior cingulate cortex. an area important for motivation and reward, and error detection. So there may also be direct connections between brain areas important for an optimistic outlook and thinking efficiency.


Mindsets and Math / Science Achievement
Optimism
Penn Resiliency Lessons pdf
Optimism fMRI
Children with positive outlooks are better learners

More Vision Wars: Visual Training for Dyslexics

The role of visual challenges in dyslexia has a long and contentious history. Although the authors of the recent consensus statement on Vision and Dyslexia were trying to clarify the most effective approach to diagnosing and treating visual processing issues in dyslexia, their statement is more likely to misinform than inform.

While not all children or adults with dyslexia have visual processing problems, many--at least two-thirds in some studies--do. This makes sense from a neurological standpoint, because several of the structural neurological features associated with dyslexia appear to predispose to visual difficulties. For example, coordinated control of the movements of the two eyes requires sending signals over long distances in white matter tracts, as well as sharing information between the two hemispheres of the brain, and oversight, modulation, and coordination by the cerebellum. Deficiencies in white matter function, interhemispheric communication, and cerebellar function are each known to be more common in dyslexic than non-dyslexic individuals (especially in the pre-adult years). In addition, many dyslexic children are known to have difficulty with muscular coordination, especially for fine motor actions. Consequently, it should not be surprising that their visual movement functions, which are controlled by many of the same neural pathways, are also poorly coordinated.

Not surprisingly, several types of visual difficulties are more common in dyslexic than non-dyslexic children. In one study of dyslexic children, just one type of visual problem, near-point convergence insufficiency, was present in 30-40% of the dyslexic children, compared to just 20% of controls. (As can be seen from this control figure, visual processing problems are also quite common in non-dyslexic school-age children). For children with convergence insufficiency, peer-reviewed NIH sponsored research has shown that home therapy can work as can home exercises with computer training, but that in-office therapy shows the best efficacy.

Not all dyslexic individuals have visual processing problems, and correction of these visual problems will not "cure" dyslexia. However, for children who have both dyslexia and visual problems, interventions (whether visual exercises, vision therapy, or glasses) will often improve their ease and endurance for reading. Many of the children who have visual difficulties will experience visual symptoms both with reading and--importantly--with other kinds of near work, and they will often be able to describe their visual symptoms if asked. They may report that they can't read clearly because the letters are blurry, or that letters wiggle or seem to move in-and-out of the page. They may also report fatigue, eye strain or tearing, headaches, or other symptoms. Both in our clinical experience and in published research data, children with such symptoms will often show benefits from visual therapy.

Again, it would be a mistake to believe that vision training "cures" dyslexia or that dyslexia is entirely or even primarily a visual disorder. Dyslexia usually involves a range of issues, nearly always including important challenges in the phonological processing system. That's why training in phonics/phonological awareness is the cornerstone of therapy for dyslexic challenges in literacy. However, differences in the phonological processing module cannot account for many of the common findings associated with dyslexia. Instead, the preponderance of available research strongly suggests that the difficulties with phonological processing, along with the difficulties with visual processing, are in turn due to more fundamental differences in neurological structure and function. That's why it is important not to limit interventions to simply addressing phonological processing challenges when children show other important challenges. When visual problems are present in individuals with dyslexia, and they commonly are, these individuals can be greatly helped by interventions that directly address their visual challenges.

The video below is from Finland, but look at the eye movements a child needs to make in order to read a passage fluently.



But also check out this video showing eye tracking movements as a fluent reader scans a web page. Many dyslexics would have trouble with this: the reading is so fast and not word-by-word, and the eyes leap to different sections of the page.



Finally, if you'd like to learn more how convergence insufficiency presents with vision problems, check out this video from the NEI:




Additional References
Eide Neurolearning Blog: Training the eyes to see
Convergence insufficiency from the Mayo Clinic
Visual Training in Basketball
Benefits of visual training at the US Airforce academy
Retraining the brain after visual stroke
Visual training improves stroke-induced hemianopic alexia