Grant: Doctoral Award - Frederick Banting and Charles Best Canada Graduate Scholarships

Developmental dyslexia is a common reading disability that begins at an early age. In addition to poor school performance, children with dyslexia show mental health problems such as depression and anxiety. These academic and mental health issues may persist into adulthood, negatively affecting a person's job prospects and quality of life. Therefore, increasing reading skills at an early age is important for their overall health as adults. Despite intensive tutoring, however, there are some children who continue to struggle with reading. It remains unknown how these children are different from their peers who show increased reading skills. Additionally, a neurobiological basis to dyslexia has been shown and some research suggests that brain measures can determine who will show persistent reading difficulties. However, further evidence is needed to associate changes in the brain with the outcomes of tutoring. The purpose of this research is to determine the behavioural and neuroimaging measures that are associated with tutoring success. Children's performance on reading and reading-related tasks will be compared before tutoring starts, after 10 weeks of school-based tutoring, and 1 year after the tutoring has finished. In addition, some children will undergo magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans to determine if there were any changes in brain activity or structure. This research will determine whether tutoring success can be predicted before tutoring starts and whether neuroimaging measures assist with the assessment process. These results will ultimately provide a method for earlier intervention and thus, better outcomes for children.