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The impact of visual-spatial attention on reading and spelling in Chinese children

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Abstract

The present study investigated the associations of visual-spatial attention with word reading fluency and spelling in 92 third grade Hong Kong Chinese children. Word reading fluency was measured with a timed reading task whereas spelling was measured with a dictation task. Results showed that visual-spatial attention was a unique predictor of speeded reading accuracy (i.e., the total number of words read correctly divided by the total number of words read in a timed reading task) but not reading speed (i.e., the number of words read correctly in the same task) after controlling for age, non-verbal intelligence, morphological awareness, phonological awareness, orthographic knowledge, and rapid automatized naming. Visual-spatial attention also explained unique variance in word spelling measured with a dictation task after the same control variables. The findings of the present study suggest that visual-spatial attention is important for literacy development in Chinese children.

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Notes

  1. Traditional Chinese is currently used in Taiwan and Hong Kong. Traditional characters have more strokes on average than simplified characters, which are currently used in Mainland China and Singapore.

  2. Perimetric complexity is calculated by the squared perimeter of the stimulus divided by its ink area. The ink area is measured with the number of inked pixels on the computer screen times the area of a pixel.

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Acknowledgments

This study was supported by the General Research Fund of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region Research Grants Council (HKIED: GRF/ECS 858113). We thank all the children, their parents and teachers, for their participation.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Special Education and Counselling, The Hong Kong Institute of Education, 10 Lo Ping Road, Tai Po, N.T., Hong Kong, P.R. China

    Duo Liu

  2. Department of Applied Psychology and Human Development, The University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada

    Xi Chen

  3. Department of Psychology, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shatin, Hong Kong, P.R. China

    Ying Wang

Authors
  1. Duo Liu
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  2. Xi Chen
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  3. Ying Wang
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Correspondence to Duo Liu.

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Liu, D., Chen, X. & Wang, Y. The impact of visual-spatial attention on reading and spelling in Chinese children. Read Writ 29, 1435–1447 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11145-016-9644-x

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