Dysgraphia: causes, symptoms and treatment

Dysgraphia is one of the disorders whose effects are noted in the development of boys and girls. from around the world, since it has to do with the difficulties when performing one of the most useful actions today: writing.

If this skill is not internalized well in childhood, this can lead to a much lower ability to communicate with other people, make lists and write to better organize your day-to-day life, or opt for jobs with great added value, among other consequences negative.

In this article we will see what characteristics, symptoms and causes are related to dysgraphia, as well as the types of treatments recommended to mitigate its effects on childhood development.

• Related article: "Learning difficulties: definition and warning signs"

What is dysgraphia?

The phenomenon by which a person (usually a boy or a girl) presents serious Difficulty writing well, either due to spelling, penmanship, or both. time. These difficulties must cross the limit of what is considered pathological, through criteria taken into account by the professional who carries out the diagnosis.

It is, therefore, a group of disorders of written expression, which in turn can be included in the category of specific learning disorders.

In turn, in practice dysgraphia is frequently accompanied by other specific learning disorders, such as dyscalculia wave dyslexia. This is because brain alterations that affect one of these functions are usually caused by defects that reach the areas of the brain responsible for carrying out the others, since they are close to each other, if not closely related.

The writing components that can be affected by dysgraphia are varied, so that the symptoms of this alteration are also affected. Among the most prominent are the following, always taking into account the age range to which the person belongs.

• inconsistent calligraphy or so strange that it is difficult to read.
• Accent problems.
• Mismanagement of spaces between words, phrases and lines.
• bad score.
• Grammar problems.
• letter substitution.
• Strange word unions.
• Improper grip of pencil or pen.

It should be noted that dysgraphia can significantly limit the ability to learn, especially in educational institutions that are not prepared to meet the needs of boys and girls who present this disturbance.

As a consequence of a frustrating and emotionally painful schooling, the mark left by this type of problem can become chronic and also affect adult life, given the obstacles to receiving a formal education.

It must be remembered that the school is both one of the main contexts for the socialization of children, as well as a way of access to stable professional trajectories and with the ability to provide all the material resources necessary to live worthily.

types of dysgraphia

As we have seen, dysgraphia affects various aspects of the ability to write. However, beyond all these variations, dysgraphia cases can be classified into two main types, according to the characteristics of the writing difficulties.

Of course, as happens in most cases with psychological disorders, normally the symptoms of each type do not present in a "pure" way. For this reason, they often partially overlap each other, and there is some ambiguity about what type of dysgraphia a patient presents.

disortography

It consists of the presence of significant problems in learning the rules of spelling in the practice of writing. This can greatly complicate school progress, and if its effects remain significantly in adulthood, they also affect, among other things, employability. For this reason, it is important to treat dysorthography as soon as possible, going to psychological therapy from the beginning of the expression of its symptoms.

motor dysgraphia

This form of dysgraphia has to do with the problems with posture, coordination and integration between movements and visual information in regards to writing.

In addition to these two types, there are cases in which it is difficult to classify what happens, since there is a wide variety of symptoms and it is not It is easy to distinguish those in which there are problems at the psychological level and those in which what is wrong is something more basic, at the psychological level. neurological.

Prevalence: what percentage of children present it?

Although there is currently little data on this, It is estimated that around 3% of boys and girls presents some problems to comply with spelling rules that can be considered cases of dysgraphia, while the rest of the difficulties associated with writing would appear with a somewhat minor.

Causes

What causes dysgraphia is still not well known, but it is most likely that behind most cases there are several causes acting at the same time. For example, genetic predispositions may be at work leading to a brain design in which the neural structures that must coordinate to produce writing do not are as well connected as they should be, or perinatal brain lesions may occur that affect these groups of neurons.

Thus, the causes of dysgraphia are non-specific, in the sense that different variables may be acting as genesis in its appearance in the first years of development during the childhood. In turn, the longer the stage in which there are serious problems when writing is prolonged, the more This phenomenon will be difficult to overcome, as pessimistic expectations appear, giving way to prophecy self-fulfilled.

Possibly various types of malformations and microlesions lead to similar results, since there is no easily identifiable brain region that alone is responsible for enabling the writing.

In addition, dysgraphia can also be caused by harmful learning dynamics, or even due to the effect of stress and anticipatory anxiety linked to the activity of writing.

• Related article: "Parts of the human brain (and functions)"

treatment for dysgraphia

Being a disorder that occurs in childhood, it is necessary to intervene in it as soon as possible so that its negative effects do not accumulate, causing the boy or girl to remain in a situation of vulnerability in their learning trajectory. The objective of these initiatives will be to compensate for this disadvantageous situation through an extra effort to write well that must be channeled through the appropriate learning and training techniques, so as not to produce exhaustion and frustration.

The main intervention technique is chaining, that is, the improvement of specific skills that little by little become something more sophisticated and that can be integrated into previous learning. This procedure makes it possible to optimize the "training" in writing, maximizing the chances that some learning will give way to the next, and preventing the person from throwing in the towel.

On the other hand, this form of training and learning (which must be guided by a specialist) must be accompanied by interventions aimed at dealing with the problems of beliefs, expectations and self-esteem that often go hand in hand with dysgraphia. All this helps to increase the commitment in therapy.

At the same time, as long as there is no rapprochement between the level of writing one has and the level of writing required minimum, it is good to present alternatives in learning assessment methods, such as exams oral.

In this way, the development of other cognitive skills will not be impeded, thus avoiding the appearance of a serious neck of bottle of learning because of having difficulties in a specific area of ​​behavior, in this case writing.

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• Faust, M. (2012). The Handbook of the Neuropsychology of Language. Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell.
• Helmann, A. L.; Calhoon, M.B.; Kern, L. (2015). "Improving science vocabulary of high school English language learners with reading disabilities". Learning Disability Quarterly. 38 (1): 40 - 52.
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• Roux, F.E.; Dufor, O.; Giussani, C.; et al. (2009). "The graphemic/front motor area Exner's area revisited". Annals of Neurology. 66 (4): 537–45.