Citation

Sigmundsson H. Brain Cogn. 2005; 58(2): 213-216.

Affiliation

Department of Sociology and Political Science, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim, Norway.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2005, Elsevier Publishing)

DOI

10.1016/j.bandc.2004.11.007

PMID

15919553

Abstract

This study was set out to explore the prediction that dyslexics would be likely to have particular problems compared to control group, on response time task when 'driving' a car simulator. The reason for doing so stems from the fact that there is considerable body of research on visual processing difficulties manifested by dyslexics. The task was to drive a car and at the same time, the driver had to use either signal button on the right side of the wheel (condition 1) or a voice-activated microphone (condition 2) immediately when a road sign appears. In condition 1, the sign appears only in the mid-field zone and in condition 2, it appears in one of six possible positions in relations to the car ahead. As predicted, it was found that the dyslexics had significantly higher response time in both conditions than their controls. Dyslexics may have visual processing deficit which not only cause reading problems but also problems perceiving rapid changes in their environment such as responding on a sign when driving.