Dyslexia literally means the inability to master language. In practice, however, the term refers to people who have extreme difficulty acquiring the ability to read and spell. Specifically, people with dyslexia have trouble learning the code for written language. Difficulty in sounding out words and spelling words persists, despite effort on the part of teachers and the learner. The person with dyslexia demonstrates a number of characteristics associated with difficulty learning to read and write.

No generally, accepted definition of dyslexia exists in the world! However, research findings over the past 25 years, in countries around the world, led to development of a descriptive definition that guides the work of the Tennessee Center for the Study and Treatment of Dyslexia. By describing what dyslexia is, the Center is able to assure accurate identification and focused treatment.


Dyslexia is found in families across the full range of socioeconomic backgrounds in society.

Only recently has a definition of dyslexia been adopted as a working definition by the National Institute for Child Health and Human Development:

"Dyslexia is one of several distinct learning disabilities. It is a specific language-based disorder of constitutional origin characterized by difficulties in single word decoding, usually reflecting insufficient phonological processing. These difficulties in single word decoding are often unexpected in relationship to age and other cognitive and academic abilities; they are not the result of generalized developmental disability or sensory impairment. Dyslexia is manifest by variable difficulty with different forms of language, often including, in addition to problems with reading, a conspicuous problem with proficiency in writing and spelling"
(The Orton Dyslexia Society Research Committee April, 1994).

The most common form of dyslexia is associated with the phonological core deficit referred to in the definitions above. People with this disability have extreme difficulty isolating and sequencing syllables and sounds in words. At the syllable level, this results in mixing up the order of syllables in a word or omitting a syllable -- saying or writing "intimate" for "imitate", "agate" for "applegate", "Willim for William", "intivation" for "invitation". At the sound (phoneme) level, the phonological core deficit results in extreme difficulty learning to pair letters of the alphabet with speech sounds (referred to as acquiring the alphabetic principle) and sequencing letters or sounds to produce words. For example, saying or writing "lello" for "yellow", writing "hlep" for "help", saying "patter" for "platter", writing "cooper" for "copper".

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