Jason Craggs, a doctoral student in educational psychology, has received a Fulbright Fellowship to study in Norway with one of the world’s top educational statisticians during the 2002-03 academic year.

    Craggs, who is working toward his Ph.D. in school psychology with a specialty in pediatric neuropsychology, is one of several graduate students in the College of Education using magnetic reasonance imaging (MRI) in their research work.

    He is currently coordinator of structural and functional neuro-imaging in a five-year study of brain morphology and neurolinguistic ability in dsylexia, funded by a $1.2 million National Institutes of Health (NIH) grant directed by Distinguished Research Professor and Associate Dean of Research Development George Hynd.

    Craggs will study next year with Knut Hagtvet, a professor and statistician at the University of Oslo in Norway, who was a visiting professor at UGA last year.

    He will continue his research using fMRI (functional magnetic reasonance imaging) to characterize individuals with developmental dyslexia. He will also be investigating the constructs of intelligence quotient (IQ) and academic achievement through advanced statistical techniques.

    Craggs is hoping to expand on Hynd’s previous fMRI findings of different gyral patterns – structural differences in the brain – in adults and children who have reading and language problems.

    “Now, we’re attempting to make a link between children who have reading problems and their parents,” Craggs says. “We’re using MRI to study the patterns of the way the brain is developing. This particular region of the brain can take one of four different shapes. Two of those shapes are common. Two are not. And the two that are not common are common for individuals with reading problems.”

    Craggs is hoping to show that these uncommon types of brains do not work the same way as normal types. He says other UGA researchers are doing interventions for those with reading problems and showing that these interventions can change the way that part of the brain processes information.

    “What we hope to find is that not only do people with reading problems have a different brain structure, but that we can target specific interventions that will help that brain structure function in a different way so they can overcome or compensate for their reading problems,” he says.

 In the long run, the research could lead to early diagnosis and prevention of problems occurring from reading disabilities, rather than intervention of problems that have arisen as a result of years of difficulties.

    “One use might be for genetic profiling. We could look at the parents and say, ‘we notice you have this kind of brain structure so your child has this percentage of chance for having a reading disability,” says Craggs. “So now, we can get that child into a prevention program in the first or second grade, rather than an intervention program in the 7th or 8th grade when they’re struggling in school and having other problems.”

    The Ohio native is one of three UGA students receiving a Fulbright for next year. Michele Terray, a graduate student in linguistics, will conduct research in Finland, and Andrew Byrd, a graduating senior also in linguistics, will study in Italy, according to Else Jorgensen, coordinator of UGA’s Honors Program.

    One other UGA student was awaiting word on an application to study in Syria. UGA averages about four student Fulbright awards a year out of about 15 applications, Jorgensen said.

    Craggs is the fourth student in educational psychology to receive a Fulbright in the past 15 years. Only the Institute of Ecology and the School of Music have had four student Fulbrights during that time. Linguistics has had three, two this year. Romance languages, comparative literature, forest resources, geology, and anthropology have had two. Agriculture, environmental design and English have one each.

Thursday, May 23, 2002
Writer: Michael Childs, 706/542-5889, mchilds@coe.uga.edu
Contact: Jason Craggs, 706/369-1085, jcraggs@prodigy.net