Navigating complexity: Dyslexia screening and assessment practices among educational psychologists in Cape Town's private practices
Dyslexia, classified as a specific learning disorder (SLD), remains a contentious debate globally and in South Africa, with varied conceptualisations among disciplines and stakeholders. Accurate diagnosis is complicated by the challenge of differentiating genuine learning disabilities from language proficiency issues in linguistically diverse settings. This complexity is exacerbated by a heavy reliance on Western-developed assessment tests that lack established local psychometric properties, contributing to the recognised validity-accessibility dilemma. While local research primarily focuses on culturally responsive practices related to cognitive measures or reading difficulties in general, international studies have developed comprehensive, dyslexia-specific assessment protocols and frameworks. However, systematic research examining how private practitioners navigate dyslexia-specific assessment in multilingual settings remains limited, particularly in the Cape Town context where English, Afrikaans, and isiXhosa coexist. This study addressed this critical gap by exploring how educational psychologists practising in private settings in Cape Town navigate the complexities of dyslexia screening and assessment within linguistically and culturally diverse contexts. Employing a qualitative, multiple case study design within an interpretive paradigm, the researcher utilised an integrated theoretical framework combining Bioecological Systems Theory and Cultural-Historical Activity Theory to analyse both systemic influences and practitioner agency. Data was collected via semi-structured interviews, document analysis, and field notes from eight purposively sampled educational psychologists in the Cape Town metropolitan area. The findings revealed that practitioners utilise systematic, multi-modal assessment methodologies that adhere to DSM-5-TR diagnostic criteria, relying heavily on qualitative integration and clinical judgement. However, they face overwhelming exosystemic constraints, including pervasive challenges with outdated and culturally inappropriate assessment tools, as well as critical resource shortages for Afrikaans assessment. To compensate, practitioners employed innovative adaptive strategies such as bilingual comparison assessments and context-responsive modifications, alongside extensive multidisciplinary collaboration. This study makes significant theoretical and empirical contributions to the field of study. It provides the first systematic empirical documentation of dyslexia-specific assessment practices in South African private settings, demonstrating how the integrated application of Ecological Systems Theory and Cultural-Historical Activity Theory illuminates the dynamic interplay between systemic constraints and practitioner agency in resource-constrained, multilingual contexts. By empirically documenting how educational psychologists operationalise culturally responsive practice using adaptive compensatory strategies when working with inadequate assessment infrastructures, this research advances theoretical understanding of professional expertise in contexts of scarcity. It contributes evidence-based insights to international calls for context-sensitive approaches to dyslexia assessment in linguistically diverse societies. These findings underscore the urgent need for coordinated institutional reform, encompassing the development of assessment tools, updated professional training, regulatory oversight, and policy revision, to ensure equitable and linguistically accessible dyslexia assessment for South Africa's diverse learners.
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