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Types of Dyscalculia

Dyscalculia is a learning disability in which a person has difficulty using numbers, or mathematical symbols and concepts. People with developmental dyscalculia show signs of the disability from a young age; a condition that causes the same symptoms later in life, as a result of trauma to the brain, is known as acalculia.



Dr. Ladislav Kosc, the researcher who identified the disorder in 1974, describes six types of dyscalculia within the general area of mathematical disability, each of which corresponds with specific mathematical abilities and tasks. These types of dyscalculia may occur individually or together.

  1. Lexical Dyscalculia

    • A person with lexical dyscalculia can understand mathematical concepts when talking about them, but has difficulty reading symbols such as numerals, and cannot understand them when they occur in number sentences or equations. People suffering from lexical dyscalculia may be able to read individual digits, but unable to recall their place in a larger number.

    Graphical Dyscalculia

    • Graphical dyscalculia causes difficulties with writing mathematical symbols, including but not limited to numbers. A person with this disability can understand mathematical ideas when talking about them, and can read mathematical information, but has trouble writing or using math symbols to convey this understanding.

    Verbal Dyscalculia

    • Verbal dyscalculia involves a difficulty with talking about mathematical concepts or relationships. For instance, a person with verbal dyscalculia may be able to read and write numbers, but unable to talk about them, remember their names, or recognize them when they're spoken by others.

    Ideognostic Dyscalculia

    • A person with ideognostic dyscalculia has trouble with tasks that require an understanding of mathematical ideas and relationships, such as identifying which sequence of numbers is larger or smaller. This type of dyscalculia is not limited to oral or written understanding; it is a generalized difficulty with understanding math and numbers as a whole. It can also describe a difficulty in recalling mathematical ideas after learning them.

    Practognostic Dyscalculia

    • People with practognostic dyscalculia have difficulty translating their abstract mathematical knowledge into real-world actions or procedures. They are able to understand mathematical concepts, but they have difficulty working with actual quantities, volumes or equations in a practical way.

    Operational Dyscalculia

    • Operational dyscalculia is a difficulty with performing mathematical operations or calculations. A person with operational dyscalculia can understand numbers and their relationship to one another, but finds it hard to do any kind of calculation that requires manipulating numbers and mathematical symbols.

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