Cognitive inhibition in students with and without dyslexia and dyscalculia

The present study presents a comparison of the cognitive inhibition abilities of dyslexic, dyscalculic, and control students. The participants were 45 dyslexic students, 45 dyscalculic students, and 45 age-, gender-, and IQ-matched control students. The major evaluation tools included six cognitive inhibition tasks which were restructured during principal component analysis into three categories: graph inhibition, number inhibition, and word inhibition. Comparisons of the 3 groups of students revealed that in graph inhibition, dyscalculic students performed worst of the 3 groups, with dyslexic students also performing worse than control students in this category. For number inhibition, the control students’ performances were equal to those of dyslexic students, with both groups performing better than dyscalculic students. For word inhibition, control students’ performances were equal to those of dyscalculic students; both groups had shorter response times and lower incorrect rates than dyslexic students. These results suggest the complexity of the different cognitive inhibition abilities displayed by dyslexic, dyscalculic, and control students. However, some regular patterns occurred.

► Inhibition included graphic inhibition, number inhibition and word inhibition.
► Dyscalculia performed worst in graph inhibition, and control performed best.
► Dyslexia performed worse than control students in graph inhibition.
► Both of control's and dyslexia's Number inhibition were better than dyscalculia's.
► Both of control's and dyscalculia's word inhibition were better than dyslexia's.