Reading fluency and pitch discrimination abilities in children with learning disabilities

BACKGROUND: Pitch perception and pitch matching may link to individual reading skills. OBJECTIVE: In this study, we examined pitch perception and pitch matching tasks in children with learning disabilities to determine whether there was any connection between these tests and the reading fluency in these children. METHOD: The study used different types of pitch discrimination tests and reading fluency tests to compare the two groups. RESULTS: Results indicated that the accuracy of pitch discrimination and reading fluency was significantly different in these children with learning disabilities relative to typically developing children. This study also indicated that they exhibit impaired pitch matching, which linked to their reading skills. CONCLUSION: The results indicate that processing and production of speech may be impacted by individuals’ musical pitch perception and matching ability. The results may also give us a piece of evidence that we need further research on how these deficits in musical pitch perception affect our speech and language production in children and adults.