What do Ikea founder Ingvar Kamprad, Sir Richard Branson, Billionaire investor Charles Schwab, Walt Disney, and Henry Ford have in common? All are or were successful entrepreneurs with dyslexia — a learning disorder that makes it very difficult to read, write, and spell. People with dyslexia have trouble connecting the letters they see to the sounds they make and as a result, often struggle in school.
But in the real world, they make great achievements. They’re behind some of the most successful companies on Earth.
Richard Branson is one of the greatest entrepreneurs of our time. He created numerous businesses under the Virgin umbrella and has a net worth of $5 billion. Branson once admitted that Virgin which now employs 90,000 people would not have been successful had he not been dyslexic. Branson had a hard time keeping up with his peers because of his dyslexia and dropped out at the age of 16. Yet he transformed his weakness into an advantage. He understood the importance of communicating well. And his dyslexia also forced him to delegate tasks to those who excelled in the areas where he was weak.
Research has found people with dyslexia are more likely to delegate authority and also twice as likely to own two or more businesses. A study out of Cass Business School in London found more than a third of American entrepreneurs surveyed showed signs of dyslexia. Another commissioned by the BBC found 40% of that country’s self-made millionaires showed some signs of the learning disability. That’s significantly higher than the estimated 5% to 10% of the general population with some degree of dyslexia.
The question is: Are their entrepreneurial strengths a result of nature or nurture? A dyslexia expert believes they are naturally better at certain things, like picking up social cues. In an article in The Sacramento Bee about California governor Gavin Newsom who has dyslexia, Dr. Marilu Gorno-Tempini of UC San Francisco said, “He can understand what people need and their emotions more than others. I don’t think that’s a compensation. I think that’s the superpower of his dyslexic brain.” She and other scientists at UC San Francisco recently discovered children with the disorder had greater changes in heart rate and facial behavior when they viewed video clips of others experiencing emotions compared to children without dyslexia.
Eleanor Palser, one of the researchers who conducted the study, concluded to Newsthink, “This tells us that dyslexia might be associated with biological differences in empathy(移情)...”
【小题1】Why are some famous people mentioned in Paragraph 1?| A．To demonstrate their problems. |
| B．To advertise their products. |
| C．To show their achievements. |
| D．To introduce the topic. |
| A．He never gave up studying during adolescence. |
| B．Dyslexia prevented him from being more successful. |
| C．He worked hard to improve his communication skills. |
| D．Dyslexia drove him to appoint people to suitable posts. |
| A．Dyslexia might be associated with biological differences in empathy. |
| B．Gavin’s ability to understand others’ emotions compensates for his disability. |
| C．Children with dyslexia underwent more physical changes when watching videos. |
| D．Those who have dyslexia develop their ability to read others’ emotions by nurture. |
| A．How People With Dyslexia Succeed in life. |
| B．How Successful Entrepreneurs Overcome Dyslexia. |
| C．Why People With Dyslexia Are Extremely Empathetic. |
| D．Why So Many Successful Entrepreneurs Have Dyslexia. |
