A team of researchers from the University of Edinburgh and King College London (United Kingdom) has presented a study with monozygotic twins that links early reading with better intellectual capacity for reasoning . The work has been published in the journal Child Development .
Why can children in the same family get very different results on intelligence tests despite having many factors in common? This was the starting point of the investigation. The experts conducted a trial with 1,890 monozygotic or identical twins , examining the scores of five reading and intelligence tests performed on children when they were 7, 9, 10, 12 and 16 years old, verifying that inequalities in learning in reading between the twins were linked to later differences in intelligence.
Reading is not only associated with the development of verbal intelligence, but it is also related to non-verbal abilities such as abstract thinking. The intellectual variations were already present when the children were 7 years old, so, according to the researchers , learning to read immediately has very positive consequences on the intellectual development of children.
“What is most interesting is that we have shown how inequalities in reading skills can also translate into differences in non-verbal skills . These were measured by tasks such as puzzle completion, which involves the use of abstract thinking. And yes, reading influences intelligence. Children who do not receive enough help to learn can also see limited intellectual skills that go beyond literacy, “says Stuart J. Ritchie, leader of the study, to the Sinc agency.
