Performance of dyslexic children on cerebellar and cognitive tests

In a previous study (A. J. Fawcett, R. I. Nicolson, & P. Dean, 1996), the a uthors had found strong behavioral evidence for cerebellar deficit in a pan el of children with dyslexia. In the present study, the generality of those results was assessed. A battery of clinical tests for cerebellar dysfuncti on was administered, together with selected cognitive tests, to a further 5 9 dyslexic and 67 control children. The dyslexic children showed highly sig nificant impairments on the cerebellar tests, with deficits on postural sta bility and muscle tone comparable in magnitude with their reading and spell ing deficits. Furthermore, over 95% of the dyslexic children showed clear e vidence of deficit on muscle tone or stability The findings provide further evidence of the generality of cerebellar impairment in dyslexia. The impli cations of the cerebellar tests for screening in dyslexia are discussed.