An investigation of white matter properties as they relate to spelling behaviour in skilled and impaired readers.

RESULTS

While the inferior longitudinal fasciculus was more strongly related to spelling behaviour in skilled adults, the uncinate fasciculus was more strongly related to spelling behaviour in impaired adults. We found strong left lateralization of the arcuate fasciculus and inferior longitudinal fasciculus in both groups. However, lateralization of the inferior frontal occipital fasciculus was more strongly related to spelling response time behaviour in skilled adults, whereas lateralization of the uncinate fasciculus was more strongly related to spelling accuracy behaviour in the impaired adults.

CONCLUSION

This study provides some useful information for understanding the underlying white matter pathways that support spelling in skilled and impaired adults and underscore the advantage of adopting multiple spelling tasks and outcomes (i.e., response time and accuracy) to better characterize brain-behaviour relationships in skilled and impaired adults.