El modelo de la concepción simple de la lectura postula que la comprensión lectora es el resultado de la conjunción de dos factores: la comprensión del lenguaje oral y la destreza en la decodificación, que a su vezse asienta sobre precursorescognitivos como la conciencia fonológica y la velocidad de nombrado. Diversas pruebas internacionales han mostrado en estudiantes de Panamá un bajo nivel lector previo a la apariciónde la pandemia porSARS-CoV-2. Este estudio se realizó tras un año de suspensión de la educación presencial en el país. Su finalidad fueevaluar de forma virtual el estado del desarrollo lectorde una muestra representativa de 339 estudiantes de 2°, 4° y 6° de primaria de la región metropolitana de Panamá, estudiar la contribución a la lectura de determinadas capacidades psicolingüísticasy comprobar el ajuste del modelo de la concepción simple de la lectura en un contexto de bajo desempeño lector. Los resultados mostraron un desarrollo precario de la lectura en 2° grado. Por otra parte,el aporte a la lecturade la velocidad de nombrado fue creciendo a lo largo de la primaria y el de la conciencia fonológica resultó más persistente de lo esperado. Por último, se encontró un buen ajuste de la concepción simple de la lecturaal contexto de estudio, aunque con los rasgos distintivos deun aporte persistente del factor de decodificación a la comprensión lectora y una mayor contribución del componente de precisión quedel de fluidez al factor de decodificación.

National and international tests have yielded low reading comprehension results for education in Panama, although there is limited information regarding literacy development and performance. There are wide gaps in social inequality, access to technology, and public versus private school achievement. Considering this, after a year off from regular face-to-face classes and a partial transition to online education due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the present study utilizes existing data to carry out a pre-post comparison of the reading performance of fourth (n = 167) and sixth (n = 164) grade students in the province of Panama employing a subsample stratified by educational system for comparability (Mann–WhitneyUtest,α = 0.05). The pre-post comparison was also carried out independently in both the public (n = 235) and private (n = 106) systems, as well as an additional comparison of the average weekly hours of online academic engagement in both systems during the pandemic in fourth (n = 117) and sixth grade (n = 109). The results support a significant decrease in reading performance. Based on the comparative analysis, findings indicate that public school students interacted online with their teachers significantly less than their private schools’ counterparts; and that, in the same sample, only the public-school students exhibited a significant decrease in reading speed by phonological and lexical route with a medium effect size compared to pre-pandemic standards, greater than those reported in other contexts. This highlights the need to develop effective strategies to narrow the existing educational gaps in the country, which seem to have widened due to the pandemic, with particular emphasis on reading performance in primary school.

Reading learning disorder, or developmental dyslexia, is a chronic, neurobiological, inherited learning difficulty. Its prevalence varies depending on the orthographic transparency of the language, but also between studies with a population of the same language, so we carried out a meta-analysis of prevalence in Spanish. After reviewing Web of Science, PsycINFO, Scopus, and Google Scholar with the term "prevalence", combined with "dyslexia", "reading" or "learning disorder" and its Spanish translation and applying the exclusion criteria, 16 entries were retained. The results show an estimated prevalence of developmental dyslexia of 7.52% [5.17%; 10.91%] (p < 0.001), higher in the male sex, and a high heterogeneity not explained by any of the moderating variables studied. We reflect on the results of the meta-analysis and the absence of moderating variables that explain the heterogeneity of the prevalence reported in different contexts.

Se ha descrito la relación existente entre rendimiento lector y desempeño académico, así como el impacto que sobre ambos tiene la vulnerabilidad socioeconómica del niño/a. No existe, en cambio, abundancia de literatura sobre el impacto del nivel socioeconómico en la presencia de dislexia del desarrollo. Sobre una muestra de 216 escolares de Educación Primaria de escuelas públicas y particulares de la Ciudad de Panamá con la presencia de 12 participantes con dislexia, se estudiaron las variables de rendimiento lector, categoría socioeconómica y rendimiento académico. Aunque no se encontró en el presente estudio una relación directa entre el nivel socioeconómico de los participantes y la prevalencia de dislexia, pareciera que el grupo situado en la parte más baja de la escala ve triplicadas sus probabilidades de presentar el trastorno, en comparación con el resto de la muestra. Los resultados indican una relación más lineal entre el nivel socioeconómico y el rendimiento lector, así como el impacto negativo que la dislexia y la baja competencia lectora tienen sobre el rendimiento académico. Se propone la hipótesis de que los resultados podrían concordar con la presencia en el trastorno disléxico de un componente neurobiológico y genético, pero cuyo impacto podría ser modulado en intensidad por el componente ambiental y se reflexiona sobre la porción de bajo rendimiento escolar que podría evitarse con políticas activas de abordaje de la dislexia

In a low-reading-achievement context, this study examines the applicability of the Simple View of Reading in the Dominican Republic, a Spanish-speaking country, assessing elementary students across the first seven years of formal schooling, and it investigates the contribution of key psycholinguistic precursors to decoding fluency and reading comprehension across public and private schools. Structural equation models were estimated for a sample of 1168 Dominican students across three grade-level clusters and for each educational subsystem (public vs. private). Model fit indices support the adequacy of the proposed latent structure. Our findings reveal that decoding emerges as the primary predictor of reading comprehension in the early grades, whereas language comprehension becomes increasingly influential in later grades—although this shift appears to occur later than reported in other contexts, particularly within public schools. Moreover, phonological awareness contributes persistently to decoding (even in 6th–7th), supporting the hypothesis of delayed decoding automatization, which could account for the reading-comprehension difficulties identified in international assessments. Socioeconomic position exhibits a decreasing effect on reading comprehension as students’ progress through school, although it remains significant at all grades. These findings highlight the need for educational policy approaches that accelerate decoding automatization to free cognitive resources for comprehension processes, emphasizing effective phonological-awareness training and explicit, systematic literacy instruction.

This study examined differences in reading performance between public and private school students in the Dominican Republic—a country with historically low reading achievement in international assessments—and explored the influence of socioeconomic factors on these outcomes. A total of 1,168 students from second grade to the beginning of secondary school were assessed using standardized instruments to evaluate psycholinguistic precursors of reading (phonological awareness, rapid automatized naming, short-term verbal memory, and alphabetic knowledge), oral language skills (vocabulary, grammatical comprehension, and oral comprehension), and reading performance (fluency and comprehension). Results revealed significant performance differences between public and private school students across nearly all variables, with medium to large effect sizes favoring the private system, particularly in reading fluency. Linear regression analyses identified family income as the most consistent predictor of reading fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension, while parental education also showed specific effects by grade level. Controlling for socioeconomic status (SES) substantially reduced or eliminated most differences between systems, especially in comprehension and linguistic skills, suggesting that SES explains much of the educational gap linked to structural inequalities. However, medium effect sizes persisted in decoding fluency, indicating a possible residual impact of the educational system. Findings underscore the urgent need to strengthen early reading instruction and to ensure universal access to high-quality pre-primary education, as 40% of public-school students lack functional reading ability by the end of 2nd grade. These results highlight the importance of educational policies aimed at mitigating structural inequities and promoting equitable literacy development in the Dominican Republic.