Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Twice Exceptional Hyperlexia and academic achievement

My DD was a very early reader...picking out words at 17 months, 2nd grade level by 24 months, Rainbow Fairy books at 30 months. She loved books and would reenact the stories she read. She had great comprehension given her life experiences and age. She had a phenomenal memory which helped her learn to read by sight words. It seemed her mission in life was to read by 2. By 24 months she was typing short sentences on the computer.
Was she hyperlexic? No one ever assessed her, but in recent years she has been dx with Aspergers.
She does have a very high IQ (170 ex norms), so I now believe she is highly gifted with ASD, but also a highly precocious reader.

Academically, she is doing very well, her WIAT scores came at a time when school was failing her, but since then, she has taken off and is still 5 or so grades ahead of where she should be.

Thank you everybody for answering.

Our psychologist (the one who diagnosed him with PDD-NOS in the past) is licensed as a homeschool test administator and at the end of the year he gave him an above-grade Iowa-CogAT combo test, normed for the end of grade 2, when my son just finished the first grade. The above-grade test was to avoid hitting a ceiling. This is something he does a lot for all of his PDD-NOS patients as he doesn't trust the school academic assessments. We just got the results:

Well, here are his Iowa:
Vocabulary - 92%ile (3.6 grade equivalent)
Reading comprehension - 96%ile (3.7)
Spelling - 99%ile (4.5)
Math concepts - 99%ile (4.2)
Math problems - 97%ile (3.8)
Math computations - 99%ile (3.4)

But his CogAT isn't nearly as strong:
Verbal - 62%ile
Quantitative - 86%ile
Nonverbal - 92%ile
Composite - 86%ile

The test is above-grade, so I am not sure how much this contributed to the results, but it is obvious that his fluid intelligence isn't as strong as crystallized. His "predicted national percentile rank" was in the 70%ile based on Cogat, when his actual are all in the 95+%ile. Is this his PDD coming through like that - not being enough abstract and being too literal? Or his high achievement scores are "just" his hyperlexia, when his Cogat scores represent his actual intelligence?

My daughter's Cogat scores are in some cases several standard deviations below her WISC-V subscores, so I am not sure how much I trust it. But I see a lot of gifted kids here do really well on it, so I just don't know.

Not surprisingly, most of the hyperlexia research and even the posts here focus on the very young children. There is very little in terms of "what to expect" for older kids who grow out of their ASD label. The hyperlexia-IQ research shows no increase in IQ compared to average, but the research mostly focuses on ASD population with and without hyperlexia.

The hyperlexia clinic in Illinois (CSLD) says that recruiting kids for hyperlexia type 3 studies is very challenging because they are very rare and difficult to identify at a young age (differentiate them from ASD kids), so a large practical longitudinal study has never been done.

CogAT: flip through a few CogAT threads here, and you'll see that many children with very high WISC scores perform markedly lower on the CogAT, so while some do well, quite a few do not.

Keep in mind also that the CogAT primary level is entirely pictorial (no reading or calculating), with a significant listening comprehension component, and not insubstantial social comprehension demands, on the verbal portion. If you reference some of the hyperlexia links mentioned earlier, remember that deficits in listening comprehension are often paired with hyperlexic behaviors, so that reading is a more effective channel for accessing environmental input than listening is. Bing. Poor performance on the CogAT verbal, and high reading comprehension scores.

And if one were to interpret the scores as given, it would suggest that his fluid reasoning is quite a bit better than his concrete intelligence, actually, as the highest score was in nonverbal, which is usually most closely associated with fluid reasoning.

Oh, and CogAT is normed by age, typically, but can be reported on grade norms. You would have to consult your evaluator or evaluation report to determine which was used in this case.

Caveat on the ITBS: Notice how low the ceiling is on the ITBS grade 2, especially in math, making the grade equivalents even less reliable than their general level of unreliability, and suggesting that the percentile differences between math areas are also not significant (probably reflective of a difference in one or two items). For example, the grade equivalent of the 99th %ile in math computations is only about half a year beyond the 50th %ile, and clearly doesn't include mastery of all multiplication facts. I wouldn't read too much into concrete skill/abstract application achievement differences.

Do you normally see a big jump between Grade 2 Cogat and later years for hyperlexic kids, when Cogat goes from picture-based to reading-based? Do NT children stay on the same percentile (+/-error) between pictorial and word-based Cogat? I am not sure I understand this at all. Why do they use a picture-based test at all for 2nd graders? How does it predict any future academic performance? Is WISC-V verbal comprehension section pictorial? Are there any good reads on this?

Do you know in general, how does an above-grade test is scored for younger or older children? Do they norm 2nd grade ITBS separately on 1st graders, 2nd graders and 3rd graders? If the Cogat was actually end-of-the-year grade 2 Cogat but he just finished the 1st, how would they calculate his age score in this case? Do they have norms that go up and down a few years for each test?


That's a very good point. So this is some sort of lingering receptive speech delay? He did have some at the time when he was diagnosed with PDD-NOS, but it was mild enough. His expressive speech delay was much greater - enough to qualify for services. At the same time it is generally said that hyperlexic kids have poor reading comprehension - they can read more than they can understand. If his listening issues are a part of his hyperlexia, then how does his 96%ile reading comprehension come into this? Is it still hyperlexia if his reading understanding is that good?

Why is his quantitative score that much lower than his math concepts etc?

I can't really say normally, as I don't have enough data (not enough cases) to say what is usual in hyperlexic kids. NT kids generally speaking (no LDs or other educationally-relevant disabilities) do about the same on the pictorial and text-based CogAT, by definition (they are the basis of the norms and percentiles). The pictorial test is used in the primary years because of the wide range of reading levels obtained in the non-disabled population in that age group, so that reasoning/learning aptitude and decoding skills are not confounded. By the end of third grade, the majority of children can read fluently. The WISC-V VCI has negligible visuals (none for children who are at least average in intelligence), relying entirely on oral verbal ability. A small amount of receptive language is required (comprehension of single words--one at a time for Vocabulary, and two at a time for Similarities), and a moderate amount of expressive language (to provide the responses; it is possible to obtain maximum scores using only single word responses, though most children use phrases or sentences).

Out-of-level achievement testing usually compares examinees to the standard norm group. So your DC's ITBS scores compare him to children on the average a year older and a grade more experienced. His CogAT should have been calculated on age-norms, using his chronological age peers. They do typically have age norms that extend a bit beyond the typical age range. I don't believe I've seen them more than a year out, though.

Is it still hyperlexia? Depends on which definition of hyperlexia we are using. Listening comprehension is also not the same as reading comprehension, even though both involve language comprehension. I've seen plenty of students who can do one but not the other (both directions).

Quantitative reasoning, like verbal, doesn't actually measure any math skills, just problem-solving related to mathematical thinking. A few possibilities: he may have had difficulty interpreting the questions, been uncomfortable/unfamiliar with the testing procedures, etc.

Thanks again for the information!


I know as a group, the scores will be the same, due to normalization, but at individual level, I don't believe this is true. I bet kids that are great at listening would do better on grade 2 Cogat and kids that are great at reading would do better on later grades. Grade-to-grade repeatibility can't be good. Could you please share any data you have on it? It probably explains why in our school district there are two waves of gifted kids - one in the 2nd grade when everyone is tested and one in the 4th, on the re-test. The second wave is more likely to test well again in the 6th grade for the middle school program.


Do you think hyperlexia 3 even exists? I mean 10% of the ASD cases recover (30% of the HFA cases in some studies), so it stands to reason that some of these cases had hyperlexia (may be even most), but somehow the impression is that it wasn't ASD at all but this hyperlexia 3 instead. Do you believe hyperlexia has anything to do with giftedness or like most professionals in your field you think it is a part of the spectrum?

There is certainly a fair amount of variability on re-administration with CogAT. I definitely have seen scores range widely over the years. The tests are in two-year bands, if I recall correctly, so that a certain number of items overlap from year to year, with the items pretty much turning over entirely by the time you get two years out. Keep in mind, also, regression to the mean and standard error. I believe I've linked this interesting article by the author of CogAT in the past:

https://faculty.education.uiowa.edu/docs/dlohman/Understanding_and_predicting_regression.pdf

in this thread:

http://giftedissues.davidsongifted....sion_to_the_Mean_Why_tes.html#Post230897

Backing up a moment on the question of syndromes existing/not existing, let's remember that there is no definitive physical/chemical/biological/imaging test for ASD, hyperlexia, or many other psychological/psychiatric disorders. We classify collections of symptoms in an attempt to impose our own order on the extreme diversity of human neurological development. I prefer to treat diagnostic categories as useful if they lead to improvements in the development, life functions, or personal understanding of the individual in question.

That being said, I think that hyperlexia, if it is defined specifically as fluent decoding without commensurate comprehension, may or may not overlap with giftedness, and may or may not overlap with ASD, but probably is less likely to overlap with giftedness, and more likely to overlap with some form of savantism, whether on the spectrum or otherwise. If it is defined as fluent decoding with or without commensurate comprehension, then, in the case of with comprehension, I think it is more likely to overlap with giftedness, with or without some other neurological/neuropsychological condition (such as a communication/language disorder, or ASD), and less likely to be solely a manifestation of ASD.

But that's just my opinion.

As always - I very much appreciate the time you take to answer my questions.

From reading and talking to people at CSLD in Chicago about it I understand that reading comprehension ability is the key differentiation in hyperlexia types.

If a young child decodes well, but has lower IQ (70) and comprehends what he decodes only at the level of his IQ, it is considered true hyperlexia, as in a disability and is much more likely to occur in ASD cases or other developmental disorders. If a young child decodes well and comprehends at his IQ level of 140, then there is no doubt that this is just precious gifted reading. These two outlying cases are pretty clear.

The real question is with the kids who decode well above their chronological age but comprehend at their IQ level, when their IQ level is more typical - 85-125 (like it is probably in my son's case, based on Cogat). Is that still a part of some disability or just a specific advanced ability unrelated to IQ, like music or art skill or sports?

Are advanced math abilities common in hyperlexic kids? There is zip about it in the hyperlexia studies. Nothing at all - everyone just focuses on single word reading. There is one study ("Reading and arithmetic in adolescents with autism spectrum disorders: Peaks and dips in attainment.") that says groups with arithmetic ability peaks and reading ability peaks are mutually exclusive. So is having a 99%ile math ability on top of above-level word decoding differentiates from the hyperlexia as a disability?

Are advanced spelling skills common in hyperlexia? Does spelling require comprehension? Some say yes, some say no.

This is so confusing....

I have a child who was an early reader and I suppose her decoding skills were above her comprehension. By her third birthday, she was able to decode anything put in front of her but she couldn't possibly have understood something like War and Peace. These days, with guidance, she might but not when she was 3.

She also has precocious abilities in music and math. I think this means she is very good at recognizing and learning patterns.

She is not on spectrum but she had interesting processing issues up to age 4 and she is still fearful of loud roaring sounds. She did lining up objects things too when she was two and loved toys that had wheels. So, yes, she had ASDish traits but has now grown out of them.

Her development has been uneven if not unpredictable but she is who she is and I never thought her early reading was a sign of disability. She read with expressions, she giggled and laughted at funny weird parts, she asked questions, and shared what she read with us. If she was reading with a flat voice and never uttered a comment while reading, I think I would have worried.

I suppose DD fits Hyperlexia 3. She is not the easiest child to raise but I wouldn't want her any other way.