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Comparison of children performance in reading words with and without attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder

PURPOSE: to determine if qualitative and/or quantitative differences in silent reading at the isolated word decoding level, could be shown by children with and without Attention Deficit/Hyperactive Disorders (ADHD); identify which aspects can justify these differences; characterize the abilities of silent reading's alterations, that can be specific to ADHD children; set up the possible relations between these aspects and the attention deficits. METHODS: this research followed an exploration-description design, with a qualitative approach, comparing the performance obtained in silent word reading. We applied a reading test in 60 children (20 ADHD children and 40 without ADHD), selected among 295 literate students, with ages that varied between 07 and 14 years, and we collected information in questionnaires answered by theirs parents and professors. RESULTS: the hitting ratio between all participants, did not follow a similar distribution for all categories; the visual incorrect, phonological incorrect and incorrect similar sound test categories had presented, respectively, highest concentration of errors for all the participants, and ADHD readers showed a lower performance than those verified in those without ADHD; gender characteristics and/or participants' school level did not determined significant differences in hitting ratio. CONCLUSION: the verified differences were more quantitative than qualitative, and can be justified by the lack of reader attention to the word form; ADHD readers preferentially used the phonological processing and showed various intensity difficulties in lexical processing; it was possible to demonstrate that the attention compromises reading in decoding level referring to isolated words.

Reading; Comprehension; Attention Deficit Disorder with Hyperactivity


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