The question “Why can’t I read?” often leads people to search for answers about their struggles with text. Reading difficulty is a broad term describing challenges with decoding words, reading fluently, maintaining focus, or fully grasping the meaning of what is read. This challenge is not a single issue but a complex symptom arising from physical, neurological, or environmental causes. Understanding the specific source of the difficulty is the first step toward finding an effective solution.
Sensory and Ocular Foundations
Reading is a visual act requiring the coordinated effort of the eyes and the brain. Even individuals with 20/20 distance vision can experience difficulty due to problems with binocular vision, the ability of both eyes to work together. A common issue is convergence insufficiency, where the eyes struggle to turn inward and sustain focus on a near object. This difficulty often leads to symptoms such as eye strain, headaches, blurred vision, or words appearing to move on the page.
Another mechanical factor is visual tracking, the eyes’ ability to move smoothly and accurately across a line of text. Inefficient tracking causes the eyes to skip lines, jump back to previously read words (regressions), or lose their place frequently, severely disrupting fluency and comprehension. Furthermore, an uncorrected refractive error, like a mild astigmatism, can introduce visual blur that forces the eyes to constantly strain. This constant effort depletes cognitive resources, leading to fatigue often mistaken for a lack of motivation.
Neurodevelopmental and Processing Differences
For many people, reading difficulty stems from how the brain processes language, distinct from visual acuity. The most recognized neurodevelopmental difference is dyslexia, characterized by a deficit in phonological awareness. This is the ability to recognize and manipulate the individual sounds (phonemes) that make up spoken words, making it difficult to map those sounds to letters for decoding. This foundational weakness disrupts fluent word recognition and makes the basic act of reading laborious, even in highly intelligent individuals.
Another factor is reduced processing speed, the rate at which a person can take in, understand, and respond to information. Slow processing speed means the mental steps required for reading—decoding, recalling meaning, and connecting to the sentence—take too long. This delay often causes poor comprehension because the reader forgets the beginning of a sentence before finishing it. Executive function disorders, such as Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), also significantly impact comprehension. These deficits affect the brain’s ability to manage working memory, sustain attention, and inhibit distractions, all necessary for reading lengthy passages.
Lifestyle and Environmental Contributors
Temporary or acquired factors related to daily life can compound pre-existing difficulties or cause reading challenges independently. Chronic sleep deprivation impairs cognitive functions like attention, memory, and concentration. High levels of stress and anxiety activate the body’s fight-or-flight response, diverting cognitive resources away from the prefrontal cortex, which is responsible for complex tasks like comprehension. This diversion makes sustaining focus nearly impossible during reading.
Excessive screen time contributes to digital eye strain. Staring at backlit digital devices for long periods reduces blink rates and forces the eyes to work harder to maintain focus. This results in symptoms like dry eyes, eye fatigue, and temporary blurred vision. Additionally, certain medications, including some antidepressants, stimulants, and anti-seizure drugs, can have side effects that impact cognition, such as drowsiness or mental fogginess. These effects interfere with the mental clarity and sustained attention required for reading.
Next Steps and Seeking Professional Help
Addressing reading difficulty begins with a comprehensive assessment to correctly identify the cause. It is advisable to first consult an optometrist or ophthalmologist for a thorough eye exam that goes beyond standard distance vision testing to check for conditions like convergence insufficiency. If a visual problem is identified, intervention may include corrective lenses or a program of vision therapy designed to strengthen eye coordination and tracking skills.
If the difficulty persists after a visual workup, the next step involves consulting a learning specialist or a neuropsychologist. A neuropsychological evaluation can diagnose specific learning disabilities like dyslexia by assessing underlying cognitive skills such as phonological processing, working memory, and processing speed. Assessment tools help create a precise profile of strengths and weaknesses. Specialized interventions, such as structured literacy programs like the Orton-Gillingham approach, can then be implemented alongside accommodations like extended time or text-to-speech software to support learning.