# Investigating the role of the cerebellum in reading

> **NIH NIH R01** · UNIVERSITY OF PITTSBURGH AT PITTSBURGH · 2022 · $549,480

## Abstract

ABSTRACT
 The predominant theories of developmental dyslexia view the underlying disorder as arising from
dysfunction in the cerebral cortex. Similarly, efforts to understand the neural basis of reading
development have focused largely upon the cerebral cortex. However, because predominant theories of
dyslexia do not capture its full behavioral phenotype, there has been continued consideration of
alternative perspectives on the neural substrates of reading development and dyslexia. The current
proposal evaluates one such alternative theory, the “cerebellar deficit hypothesis” proposed by
Nicolson and colleagues. We propose a variant of this hypothesis that arose from a meta-analytic
review of the reading literature, the CDH* model. In the CDH* model, a fusiform-parietal-frontal
(dorsal) pathway supports the decoding of unfamiliar printed words, with cerebellar connectivity into
this pathway improving the representational similarity between the parietal and frontal nodes. This
increases the likelihood that a given item will be decoded successfully, and thus induce orthographic
learning. A ventrally connected cerebellar-cerebral circuit involving a fusiform-temporal-frontal
pathway is proposed to play an assistive role, by providing lexical-semantic constraints when decoding
demands are high. We investigate the CDH* model across three aims involving functional magnetic
resonance imaging and behavioral studies in adult subjects, and the use of orthographic learning
protocols to study reading development from an item-based (rather than stage-based) perspective. In
Aim 1, we study adults reading words printed in a newly learned artificial orthography, and test for
predicted relationships between cerebellar-cerebral connectivity, representational similarity, decoding
success, and orthographic learning, and the impact of phonological demands on these relationships. In
Aim 2, we will test whether individuals with and without dyslexia have differences in cerebellar-
cerebral connectivity that can account for group differences in effective connectivity, decoding ability,
and orthographic learning. In Aim 3, we will use the lesion method to test for a causal relationship
between acquired cerebellar damage and impairments in decoding and orthographic learning. By
advancing current understanding of how the cerebellum – one of the brain's core learning systems –
interfaces with a cerebral reading network, the work has the potential to widely influence theories of
reading development and dyslexia.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10469503
- **Project number:** 5R01HD096738-04
- **Recipient organization:** UNIVERSITY OF PITTSBURGH AT PITTSBURGH
- **Principal Investigator:** Julie A Fiez
- **Activity code:** R01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2022
- **Award amount:** $549,480
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2019-09-12 → 2024-07-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10469503

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10469503, Investigating the role of the cerebellum in reading (5R01HD096738-04). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-23 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10469503. Licensed CC0.

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