"..research indicates that as many as 20 percent of children with dyslexia also suffer from depression and another 20 percent suffer from an anxiety disorder (Willcutt, and Gaffney-Brown 2004)." "Social and Emotional Problems Related to Dyslexia." Social and Emotional Problems Related to Dyslexia | LD Topics | LD ...
Although anxiety is not a specific learning difficulty (SpLD), it is included here as studies have found that young people with learning difficulties are more likely to experience feelings of anxiety, depression and low self esteem.
Dyslexia is a learning disability that impairs a person's ability to read. Although the disorder varies from person to person, common characteristics among people with dyslexia are difficulty with: Phonological processing (the manipulation of sounds) Spelling.
Depression. Depression is also a frequent complication in dyslexia. Although most dyslexics are not depressed, children with this kind of learning disability are at higher risk for intense feelings of sorrow and pain.
"..research indicates that as many as 20 percent of children with dyslexia also suffer from depression and another 20 percent suffer from an anxiety disorder (Willcutt, and Gaffney-Brown 2004)." "Social and Emotional Problems Related to Dyslexia." Social and Emotional Problems Related to Dyslexia | LD Topics | LD ...
Dyslexic children may be physically and socially immature in comparison to their peers. This can lead to a poor self-image and less peer acceptance. Dyslexics' social immaturity may make them awkward in social situations. Many dyslexics have difficulty reading social cues.
Individuals with dyslexia may experience marked anxiety in situations in which they feel they will make mistakes, be ridiculed, or made to feel foolish in front of others. Severe anxiety or fears are known as phobias.
Dyslexia is a learning difficulty that primarily affects the skills involved in accurate and fluent word reading and spelling. Characteristic features of dyslexia are difficulties in phonological awareness, verbal memory and verbal processing speed. Dyslexia occurs across the range of intellectual abilities.
Although most children with dyslexia are not depressed, they are at higher risk for intense feelings of sorrow and pain. Perhaps because of their low self-esteem, children with dyslexia are often afraid to turn their anger toward their environment and instead turn it toward themselves, which can result in depression.
Nonetheless, as discussed above, being dyslexic may make an individual more sensitive and prone to anxious thoughts in certain situations. Personality traits and psychological profiles too play a key role in anxiety levels.
In stressful situations, their coping mechanisms may not work and they could struggle to keep up with their peers. People with dyslexia are also often unorganized with messy hand-writing, messy workplaces, messy bag-packs etc. They may also suffer from discrimination and bullying.
Dyslexia in adulthood
Dyslexia is a complex condition that affects the way the brain processes and interprets information. Dyslexia can impact reading, writing, and spelling. Dyslexia may also affect organizational skills, concentration in noisy environments, planning, and prioritizing.
They can get easily overwhelmed
Dyslexic people tend to compare themselves to what they think of as 'normal', but being dyslexic means that you are processing the world in a fundamentally different way. Different, not wrong, and most neuro-typical people can't begin to do the things that dyslexic people find easy.
What Causes Dyslexia? It's linked to genes, which is why the condition often runs in families. You're more likely to have dyslexia if your parents, siblings, or other family members have it. The condition stems from differences in parts of the brain that process language.
Dyslexic children, like children with AD/HD, may have difficulty paying attention because reading is so demanding that it causes them to fatigue easily, limiting the ability to sustain concentration.
Dyslexic adults can experience emotions such as anxiety, anger and depression. A dyslexic partner may take their anger out on their non-dyslexic partner or feel too anxious or depressed to spend any time with them. Adults with dyslexia can also feel confused, bewildered, embarrassed, ashamed and guilty.
People often confuse dyslexia and autism for one another or conflate them for their similarities. But they are two completely different disorders that affect the brains of people in different ways. While dyslexia is a learning difficulty, autism is a developmental disorder.
Adults with dyslexia often have a wide range of nonspecific mental health, emotional, and work difficulties. They may have low self-esteem, experience shame, humiliation, or lack confidence in their ability to perform at work or school.
Struggling to spell homophones and irregular words
e.g. 'their' and 'there', 'pane' and 'pain'. Irregular words don't follow phonic rules e.g. spelling 'does' as it sounds 'duz'.
Dyslexia symptoms don't 'get worse' with age. That said, the longer children go without support, the more challenging it is for them to overcome their learning difficulties. A key reason for this is that a child's brain plasticity decreases as they mature. This impacts how quickly children adapt to change.
What does this mean for dyslexics? In summary, stress and anxiety will prevent learning. Simply thinking about or remembering the previous experiences will likely illicit the same physiological response and prevent learning.
For example, dyslexic adults may find reading aloud, completing forms, organising bills/paperwork, and completing reports or other long written tasks very challenging. The stress and apprehension relating to these tasks may only last for a few minutes until the task is completed.
There are many forms of dyslexia and not everyone diagnosed with it experiences reading this way. But seeing nonexistent movement in words and seeing letters like “d”, “b”, “p”, “q” rotated is common among people with dyslexia.