Phonological processing abilities and reading: Implications for disabled readers

The study of children's language abilities as they relate to the acquisition of reading skills has been an extremely active area of research over the past decade. Within the general area of language, individual differences in phonological processing ability have been shown to be closely associated with the attainment of beginning reading skills. In this Topical Review, the author provides an overview of research in this area that focuses on (a) the nature of phonological processing skills, (b) causal relations be-tween phonological processing ability and learning to read, and (c) attempts to train phonological processing skills. The review is particularly helpful in pointing out gaps in our present knowledge and their implications for our understanding of reading disabilities.—3KT Phonological processing refers to using phonological informa-tion—information about the sound structure of our language—in process-ing written and oral language. Over a decade of research has established that the development of phonological processing abilities plays an impor-tant, and probably even a causal, role in the acquisition of beginning read-ing skills (see Crowder, 1982; Mann