ABSTRACT
This chapter looks at some of the basic social characteristics of children with specific reading retardation. It suggests that specific reading retardation is not equally distributed throughout the population. The chapter shows that children with specific reading retardation frequently have other sorts of major problems as well; social behavior problems as well as academic problems in subjects other than reading. Rutter and Yule have suggested that the higher than expected incidence of specific reading retardation indicates that this disability constitutes more than just the botton end of a continuum of reading achievement. The English studies looked at reading retardation as well as a number of other childhood problems and have provided by far the clearest picture of the social circumstances associated with specific reading retardation. Specific reading retardation is roughly twice as common amongst 10 year olds in London than amongst children of the same age on the Isle of Wight.
