[The event-related potential characteristics of reading disabilities in children under condition of continuous...

To investigate the characteristics of event-related potential (ERP) of reading disabilities (RD) in children under the condition of continuous performance test (CPT) and their possible neurological basis.

Using ERP technique with CPT conditions, such as semantics, direction and pitch identification, 16 RD boys and their matched normal boys were tested. A comparative study was conducted to analyze these indicators of accuracy, reaction time, false alarm, wave amplitude and latency between the two groups.

Among the three kinds of identification tests, RD children had lower accuracy in pitch identification (65.4 +/- 15.9) to (78.5 +/- 12.6) and lower reaction speed (557.0 +/- 97.8) ms to (493.0 +/- 47.8) ms, as compared to the control group (P < 0.05). The false alarm rate was much higher in RD children than that in the control group with unattended-high simulation (1.1 +/- 0.7)% to (0.6 +/- 0.3)%, P < 0.05. Moreover, the P300 amplitude decreased with direction of (20.8 +/- 7.3) to (27.7 +/- 8.3) microV and pitch of (9.1 +/- 4.3) to (14.6 +/- 8.3) microV, P < 0.05. And, the latency delayed in pith of (571 +/- 78) ms to (512 +/- 62) ms, semantic cognition processing negativity Nd of (398 +/- 76) ms to (342 +/- 67) ms, pitch Nd of (373 +/- 56) ms to (327 +/- 53) ms, P < 0.05.

There was defect in selective attention of RD children, which suggested relationship between dysfunction of frontal-basal ganglia circle and RD. The ERP combined with CPT was much better than that with single target stimulation to indicate children's cognitive characteristics.