Neurophysiological measures of reading difficulty in very-low-birthweight children

Twenty-four 8-10-year-old children (13 very low birthweight, 11 control) performed a lexical decision and a semantic classification task while event-related potentials (ERPs) were recorded. Both groups were within normal range on standardized reading tests, but the very-low-birthweight group had lower scores. There were no differences between groups in reaction times or accuracy for ERP tasks. On analyses of P2a (246 ms anteriorly), P2p (336 ms posteriorly), N2a (356 ms anteriorly), and N2p (396 ms posteriorly) peaks and a late positive component, control children showed greater right than left asymmetry at P2p and greater left than right asymmetry at N2a. Very-low-birthweight children showed less asymmetry. For the late positive component, both groups showed greater left than right asymmetry, which was more marked for the semantic classification task. The results suggest that very-low-birthweight children display differing cortical utilization during reading.