JScholar Publishers What Can Attention Abilities Teach Us about Reading Comprehension in NF1? Maëlle Biotteau 1* , Elodie Tournay 2 , Eloise Baudou 1,3 , Sandrine Lelong 4 , Stéphanie Iannuzzi 3 , Nathalie Faure- Marie 3 , Pierre Castelnau 5,6,7 , Elisabeth Schweitzer 7 , Diana Rodriguez 8,9,10 , Isabelle Kemlin 8 , Nathalie Dorison 8 , François Rivier 11,12 , Maryline Carneiro 11 , Elodie Preclaire 12 , Sebastien Barbarot 13 , Valérie Lauwers-Cancès 2 , Yves Chaix 1,3 1 ToNIC, Toulouse NeuroImaging Center, University of Toulouse, Inserm, UPS, France 2 Epidemiology Department, Toulouse University Hospital, Toulouse, France 3 Children’s Hospital, Toulouse-Purpan University Hospital, Toulouse, France 4 Pediatric Clinical Research Unit, Toulouse Clinical Investigation Center, Children’s Hospital, Purpan University Hospital, Toulouse, France 5 Brain & Imaging Joint Research Unit (UMR 930), Bretonneau Hospital, Tours Regional University Hospital, Tours, France 6 University of Tours François Rabelais, Tours, France 7 Neuropediatrics & Disabilities Unit, Gatien de Clocheville Children’s Hospital, Tours University Hospital, Tours, France 8 Pediatric Neurology Department & Neurofbromatosis Referral Center, Armand Trousseau Hospital, East Paris University Hospital, Paris, France 9 University of Paris VI Pierre & Marie Curie, Sorbonne Universities, Paris, France 10 Neuroprotection of the Developing Brain Joint Research Unit (U1141), INSERM, Paris, France 11 Department of Pediatric Neurology, CHU Montpellier, PhyMedExp, University of Montpellier, INSERM, CNRS, Montpellier, France 12 Department of Pediatric Neurology & Reference Center for language disabilities, CHU Montpellier, France 13 Dermatology Clinic, Hôtel-Dieu University Hospital, Nantes, France Research Open Access Journal of Neurophysiology and Neurological Disorders Received Date: September 06, 2019 Accepted Date: October 16, 2019 Published Date: October 19, 2019 Citation: Maëlle Biotteau (2019) What Can Attention Abilities Teach Us about Reading Comprehension in NF1? J Neurophysiol Neurol Disord 5: 1-17. *Corresponding author: Maelle Biotteau, UMR 1214 - Inserm/UPS - ToNIC, Toulouse NeuroImaging Center - CHU PURPAN Pavillon Baudot - Place du Dr Baylac - 31024 TOULOUSE - Cedex 3, France, E-mail: maelle.biotteau@inserm.fr ©2019 Te Authors. Published by the JScholar under the terms of the Crea- tive Commons Attribution License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/3.0/, which permits unrestricted use, provided the original author and source are credited. J Neurophysiol Neurol Disord 2019 | Vol 5: 203 Abstract Attention span impacts reading quality in many diferent settings and it is also one of the major cognitive disorders in neurofbromatosis type 1 (NF1). Te current study aimed to evaluate the impact of attention on reading comprehension, in NF1 and non-NF1children. A multicenter, cross-sectional study was conducted in two groups of 150 children (8–12yo) with or without NF1 (75 NF1 vs. 75 non-NF1; 72 ♀-78 ♂), matched for age, gender, handedness, and reading level, with reading level considered as a continuum ranging from good to poor readers. Children with intellectual defciencies, neuro- logical and psychiatric disorders were excluded from the study. Attention skills were assessed with a parental questionnaire (CBCL) as well as a performance-based evaluation (CPT-II). Reading comprehension was assessed with a standardized reading comprehension test. Te attention performance-based scores assessed text and sentence comprehension between the two groups (p=0.0235 and p=0.0164, respectively), whereas indirect questionnaire attention scores only measured sen- tence comprehension (p=0.0263). Both groups exhibited weak correlations between questionnaire and performance-based scores. We show that reading comprehension is greatly infuenced by attention in both NF1 and non-NF1 groups, even when predictors of good reading comprehension, such as IQ score and reading accuracy, are included in the analysis. Indirect observer-rated (questionnaires) and direct performance-based evaluations of attention measure distinct factors, associated with diferent components of reading skills, and are not interchangeable assessments of attention difculties. Both assess- ments are complementary and should be used in parallel for a multimodal assessment of attention.