When you first start to try to understand dyslexia, it may be hard to separate the dyslexia facts from fiction.  There are many misconceptions about what dyslexia is, what causes it, how it is diagnosed, and the tools available to help you overcome it.  Let's try to sort some of this out.

1. One common misunderstanding about people who suffer from dyslexia is that they are slow, or unable to learn.  This is simply not true.  Many who have dyslexia are intelligent people who have no problem learning.  They just have to have the information presented to them in a different way than what is normally taught. It is often thought that smart people cannot have dyslexia, but many brilliant and famous people have or had dyslexia.  Among them, George Patton, John Irving, Albert Einstein, and Charles Schwab.
2. Dyslexia is more prevalent in low income groups or people from cultural or environmentally disadvantaged groups.  The dyslexia fact is that income, culture, environment or minority status have little or no impact on where you will find cases of dyslexia.
3. People who suffer from dyslexia see words and letters backwards or in reverse.  While dyslexics often can't identify the correct names or labels for letters or words, there is no evidence that they actually see the letters or words in reverse.  It is also not true that people who write words or letters in reverse are showing symptoms of dyslexia.  In the early stages of learning how to write, it is common for both dyslexics an non-dyslexics to write words and letters backwards.  Dyslexics don't necessarily have problems copying letters, only naming them correctly.
4. More boys than girls have dyslexia.  The dyslexia fact here is that while boys are more often diagnosed with dyslexia, the disability occurs equally in girls.
5. Dyslexia can be outgrown, or there is no treatment.  The truth is that studies show that the disability persists into adulthood in children who have dyslexia.  While many of them do go on to read accurately, it is not automatic for them and they continue to read slowly.  There are also many treatments or more appropriately many ways to teach or train dyslexics to help them overcome their disability.  Phonological training is one example and children who receive this training as early as 5 or 6 can have significantly fewer problems in later years.

As you can see, many of the things you may have thought were dyslexia facts have been disproved.  There is still a lot to learn about this disability.  For example it is thought that it is an inherited condition, but there is also evidence that it can be caused by head trauma.

I hope this article has helped clear up some of the myths about dyslexia and presented some dyslexia facts to help in your understanding and knowledge of this learning disability.


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