An individual diagnosed with dyslexia in childhood typically remains dyslexic throughout his/her life. However, the cognitive profile of adults with dyslexia has been less explored than that of children. This meta-analytic study is intended to clarify three questions: (1) To what extent, and in what manner, do adults with reading difficulties (dyslexia) differ from typical adult readers in measures of reading and writing competence and related cognitive skills?; (2) To what extent do speed measures pose a greater challenge than accuracy measures in an adult population that has already had years of print exposure?; and (3) To what extent does orthographic transparency modulate the reading profile of adults with dyslexia? A total of 178 studies comparing adults with dyslexia and matched controls were reviewed. The results showed that adults with dyslexia exhibited poor performance on almost all reading and writing tasks expressed by very large effect sizes (range 1.735 ≤ d ≤ 2.034), except for reading comprehension (d = 0.729). Deficits in reading- and writing-related variables are also present but with a lower expression (range 0.591 ≤ d ≤ 1.295). These difficulties are exacerbated for speed measures, especially for word and pseudoword reading, phonological awareness and orthographic knowledge. Orthographic transparency proved to be a significant moderator of dyslexic deficits in word and pseudoword reading, reading comprehension, spelling and phonological awareness, with the expression of the deficits being weaker on transparent—as opposed to intermediate and opaque—orthographies. Overall, the meta-analysis shows that reading and writing difficulties persist in adulthood and are more pronounced in speed measures. Moreover, symptoms are more severe for reading and writing than they are for measures tapping into the cognitive processes underlying reading skills. Orthographic transparency has a significant effect on the manifestation of dyslexia, with dyslexia symptoms being less marked on transparent orthographies. In addition, phonological awareness seems to be a minor problem in adulthood, especially for transparent orthographies.

在童年时期被诊断患有阅读障碍的个体通常一生都患有阅读障碍。然而，与儿童相比，成人阅读障碍的认知特征较少被探索。这项荟萃分析研究旨在阐明三个问题：（1）有阅读困难（阅读障碍）的成年人在阅读和写作能力以及相关认知技能的测量方面与典型的成年人有什么程度和方式？（2）在已经有多年印刷品暴露经验的成年人口中，速度测量比准确度测量在更大程度上面临更大的挑战？（3）正字法透明度会在多大程度上影响阅读障碍成年人的阅读能力？共有178项研究比较了成年人与阅读障碍者和相匹配的对照者。 ≤d≤  2.034），除了阅读理解（d  = 0.729）。在reading-和写入相关变量缺陷也存在但是具有较低的表达（范围0.591  ≤d≤ 1.295）。这些困难会因速度测量而加剧，尤其是单词和伪单词阅读，语音意识和拼字法知识。拼字法透明度被证明是单词和伪单词阅读，阅读理解，拼写和语音意识方面的阅读障碍的重要原因，并且拼字法的表达相对于中级和不透明字法更弱。总体而言，荟萃分析表明，阅读和写作困难在成年后仍然存在，而在测速方面则更为明显。此外，对于阅读和写作而言，症状要比针对进入阅读技能的认知过程的措施更为严重。正字法透明度对阅读障碍的表现有重要影响，阅读障碍症状在透明拼字法上较少出现。此外，语音意识似乎在成年时是一个小问题，尤其是对于透明拼字法而言。