The balance between stability and plasticity of the Visual Word Form Area in dyslexia

Abstract Understanding the balance between plastic and persistent traits in the dyslexic brain is critical for developing effective interventions. This longitudinal intervention study examines the Visual Word Form Area in dyslexic and typical readers, exploring how this key component of the brain’s reading circuitry changes with learning. We find that children with dyslexia show significant differences in Visual Word Form Area presence, size, and tuning properties compared to typical readers. While reading intervention improves reading skills and increases Visual Word Form Area size, disparities persist a year later, suggesting that Visual Word Form Area abnormalities are enduring traits of dyslexia. Our results reveal long-term neural and behavioral changes, while also elucidating stable differences in the functional architecture of the dyslexic brain. This work provides comprehensive insights into the potential and limitations of short-term learning-induced plasticity in human visual cortex. Competing Interest Statement The authors have declared no competing interest. Footnotes The manuscript has undergone several rounds of peer-review and additional information has been added to the introduction, results, discussion, methods, and conclusion. Also, several supplemental analyses, figures, and tables have been added to the manuscript. Finally, the data and code associated with the manuscript have been published on public repositories. https://github.com/jamielmitchell/Mitchell_TraitStateVWFA_2025