Browsing by Subject "matemaattinen oppimishäiriö"

Aims of the thesis. Effects of dyscalculia are severe for one’s life, having also a considerable societal impact. Therefore, predicting it at an early age would improve overall well-being. Dyscalculia and its predictive factors are still poorly understood. Cognitive predictive factors have been studied using longitudinal research strategies with the help of already existing measures of cognitive factors and mathematical ability. Early screening of the disorder would help to identify the children in need of support before the beginning of school so they wouldn’t fall more behind. The aim of this thesis is to review the literature considering cognitive predictive factors of dyscalculia in preschool. Methods. The literature search was done in Google Scholar using keywords ”preschool dyscalculia predictor*” and ”(dyscalculia OR mathematical difficult*) AND predictor* AND preschool*”. Only papers associated with dyscalculia discussing cognitive factors in preschool children and published since 2005 were included. Results and discussion. Regarding domain-general factors, working memory and executive functions were particularly predictive for later emerging dyscalculia. From domain-specific factors understanding of cardinality, preparing arithmetic skills, procedural counting and with inconsistent results magnitude comparison skills predicted dyscalculia. No single factor alone was sufficient to predict the disorder, but a combination of different domain-general and domain-specific factors gave the best prediction. For future research, it would be beneficial to separate low-achieving children from dyscalculic ones and to be consistent with the threshold when difficulties are severe enough to be classified as a disorder.