A quick glance back at X Factor audition tapes proves it: at their core, the One Direction boys are average: averagely charming, averagely beautiful and averagely talented, elevated above their utterly usual beginnings by forces outside of their control.
The finding that RAN levels of gifted children and averagely intelligent children with dyslexia were similar indicates that a RAN deficit is an important risk factor underlying the literacy deficits in both groups.
First, a comparison was made between gifted children with dyslexia and averagely intelligent children with dyslexia, controlling for literacy level.
For the first part of the analyses, cognitive profiles of gifted children with dyslexia and averagely intelligent children with dyslexia were compared, controlling for differences in literacy level.
First, the cognitive profiles of gifted children with dyslexia and averagely intelligent children with dyslexia were compared controlling for differences in literacy levels, by reanalyzing the data of two subgroups presented in van Viersen et al. (2014).
To adjust for differences in literacy levels between the gifted children with dyslexia and the averagely intelligent children with dyslexia, age and a literacy composite were used as covariates.
However, the low percentage of children with above average scores on VSTM shows that it might not be a strength either and illustrates the relatively strong performance of gifted children on this task compared to averagely intelligent children with dyslexia.
The counterevidence, i.e., the higher scores on PA and VSTM of the gifted children with dyslexia compared to the averagely intelligent children with dyslexia, may (partly) be the result of the "task impurity problem" (van der Sluis, de Jong, & van der Leij, 2007), which concerns compensation on task-related aspects.
It is averagely compelling (I finished it), involves an average amount of concentration and, if such a thing makes sense, is averagely well written: excellent in its averageness!
Accordingly, compensation is attested when, while matched on literacy performance, the cognitive profiles of gifted children with dyslexia are characterized by more severe deficits than averagely intelligent children with dyslexia, as otherwise there would be no room for protective factors to compensate.
The first comparison showed that gifted children with dyslexia had similar (low) scores on RAN compared to averagely intelligent children, but also seemingly less severe deficits in PA and VSTM.
