Longitudinal Twin Study of Early Reading Development (supplement)

描述（由申请人提供）：拟议的研究将完成第一个国际纵向双胞胎研究的遗传和环境影响的预阅读和早期阅读相关的技能，从学前班到幼儿园结束，第一，第二年级，当主要重点是“学习阅读”，并在第四年级结束时，当主要重点是“阅读学习。“来自注意力，语音意识，快速命名，言语记忆，词汇，语法，形态学和印刷知识的学前数据正在被用来形成可靠的综合分数和潜在特征，用于并发和发展行为遗传分析。在接下来的4年里，我们建议完成对487对双胞胎的阅读和相关技能的随访评估，直到二年级结束，并将纵向设计扩展到四年级结束，增加对双胞胎的阅读和听力理解的重视，并对他们的印刷品曝光。与双胞胎的阅读和语言发展相关的环境测量包括在内，以帮助确定有助于对来自共享和非共享环境的影响进行行为遗传估计的特定因素，并确定阅读和语言发展中潜在重要的基因型-环境相关性。将对来自科罗拉多研究的双胞胎数据进行比较，并在适当情况下与来自澳大利亚和斯堪的纳维亚平行研究的双胞胎数据相结合，以更有力地分析阅读和相关技能的个体差异和残疾。先前对年龄较大的儿童和成人的双胞胎研究表明，在阅读和相关技能的个体差异和群体缺陷方面，遗传和环境的影响都很强，但这些影响的发展途径及其对干预的影响尚不清楚。完成拟议的纵向双胞胎研究，从学前班到四年级将提供重要的新证据，关于遗传和环境病因的个体差异和残疾在这个关键时期的早期阅读发展。阅读障碍以及相关的注意力和语言技能困难是重要的公共卫生问题。拟议的研究将推进我们对它们的遗传和环境病因学，它们的补救措施以及它们在同卵和异卵双胞胎对的高度代表性人群样本中的表达的理解。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The proposed research will complete the first international longitudinal twin study of genetic and environmental influences on pre-reading and early reading-related skills from preschool through the end of kindergarten, 1st, and 2nd grades, when the primary focus is on "learning to read", and at the end of 4th grade, when the primary focus is on "reading to learn." Preschool data from measures of attention, phonological awareness, rapid naming, verbal memory, vocabulary, grammar, morphology, and print knowledge are being used to form reliable composite scores and latent traits for concurrent and developmental behavior-genetic analyses. Over the next 4 years, we propose to complete follow-up assessments of reading and related skills for 487 twin pairs through the end of 2nd grade, and extend the longitudinal design to the end of 4th grade with increased emphasis on the twins' reading and listening comprehension, and on their print exposure. Environmental measures related to the twins' reading and language development are included to help identify specific factors that contribute to behavior-genetic estimates of influences from shared and non-shared environment, and to identify potentially important genotype-environment correlations in reading and language development. The twin data from the Colorado study will be compared and combined where appropriate with twin data from parallel studies in Australia and Scandinavia for more powerful analyses of individual differences and disabilities in reading and related skills. Previous twin research with older children and adults has shown strong genetic and weaker environmental influences on both individual differences and group deficits in reading and related skills, but the developmental pathways for these influences and their implications for intervention are not well understood. Completion of the proposed longitudinal twin study from preschool through the 4th grade will provide important new evidence regarding the genetic and environmental etiology of individual differences and disabilities across this critical period of early reading development. Reading disabilities and related difficulties in attention and language skills are important public health problems. The proposed research will advance our understanding of their genetic and environmental etiology, their remediation, and their expression in a highly representative population sample of identical and fraternal twin pairs.