Copying skills in relation to word reading and writing in Chinese children with and without dyslexia

Because Chinese character learning typically relies heavily on rote character copying, we tested independent copying skill in third- and fourth-grade Chinese children with and without dyslexia. In total, 21 Chinese third and fourth graders with dyslexia and 33 without dyslexia (matched on age, nonverbal IQ, and mother’s education level) were given tasks of copying unfamiliar print in Vietnamese, Korean, and Hebrew as well as tests of word reading and writing, morphological awareness, rapid automatized naming (RAN), and orthographic processing. All three copying tasks distinguished dyslexic children from nondyslexic children with moderate effect sizes (.67–.80). Zero-order correlations of the three copying tasks with dictation and reading ranged from .37 to .58. With age, Raven’s, group status, RAN, morphological awareness, and orthographic measures statistically controlled, the copying tasks uniquely explained 6% and 3% variance in word reading and dictation, respectively. Results suggest that copying skill itself may be useful in understanding the development and impairment of literacy skills in Chinese.

► Chinese children with dyslexia appear to have difficulty in tasks of copying unfamiliar scripts.
► Copying skill was moderately correlated with Chinese word reading and dictation.
► Copying tasks uniquely explained both Chinese word recognition and dictation.
► Copying skill itself is useful for understanding Chinese literacy development.