The effect of neurotherapy on the rate of learning disabilities in primary school students

Abstract

Introduction: Learning disabilities are among the most common problems of children that can seriously damage the present and future life of a child if they are not diagnosed and treated timely. Aim: This study aimed to investigate the effect of neurotherapy on the rate of learning disabilities in students who suffer from this disorder. Method: A quasi-experimental research method with a one-group pretest-posttest design was used. The statistical population of the study consisted of all children with learning disabilities who referred to Imam Hossein (AS) clinic of Yazd (as a clinic affiliated to the Education Organization) in 2017, out of which 23 students were selected using a convenience sampling method. Patients underwent neurotherapy for ten sessions. The tools used in the study included the Colorado Learning Disability Questionnaire (Wilcott et al., 2011) and Quantitative Electroencephalography. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics (mean and standard deviation) and inferential statistics (paired t-test) by SPSS Version 20. Results: The results showed that neurotherapy led to a decrease in the mean total score of learning disorders. As the significance level of paired t-test (p≤0.05) was less than 0.05, it could be said that reading disorders, social cognition problems, social anxiety, spatial and mathematical difficulties in students have significant differences in the pre-test and post-test. Conclusion: According to the results, neurotherapy can be used as a method for the treatment of reading disorders, social cognition problems, social anxiety, and spatial and mathematical difficulties, and it can improve learning disabilities.

Keywords

• children
• learning disabilities
• neurotherapy