Dyslexia: a window into the cortical mechanisms of adaptive speech analysis

Atypical phonological processing is at the core of developmental dyslexia and is linked to aberrant tracking and analysis of auditory information in the cortex. Despite the importance of these mechanisms for speech processing and linguistic development, oral language comprehension in dyslexia remains largely intact. Recent findings suggest that dyslexia-linked atypical cortical processing patterns reflect both underlying deficits and compensatory strategies. This review synthesizes recent evidence linking atypical cortical tracking of auditory information in dyslexia, language development, and neurocognitive mechanisms of adaptive and resilient speech comprehension. We propose hemispheric rebalancing of linguistic analysis as a key compensatory mechanism in dyslexia, supported by interhemispheric connectivity within the distributed bilateral language network and greater reliance on lexico-semantic features during speech processing.