Tzipi Horowitz-Kraus

Tzipi Horowitz-Kraus (ציפי הורוביץ-קראוס, born 12 July, 1978) is an Associate Professor, head of the Educational Neuroimaging Group in the Faculty of Education in Science and Technology at the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology. She also holds positions as an associate professor at the Department of Neuropsychology at the Kennedy Krieger Institute and at the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.

Early Life and Education

In 2002 Tzipi Horowitz-Kraus received her Bachelor of Science in biology and in 2004 she received her Master of Science in Neurobiology from the Department of Neurobiochemistry at Tel-Aviv University in Tel Aviv, Israel. She subsequently obtained her Master of Arts (M.A.) in the clinical program for the diagnosis and treatment of learning disabilities, graduating cum laude in 2007, and her Ph.D. in 2009 from the Edmond J. Safra Brain Center for the Study of Learning Disabilities at the University of Haifa, Israel.

Career

Following her Ph.D., Horowitz-Kraus conducted post-doctoral research at the University of Haifa. Her research focused on determining behavioral and electroencephalographic measures following intervention programs for children with learning disabilities and developing objective measures to assess the effectiveness of interventions for reading difficulties.

In 2011, she was awarded a Fulbright Scholarship, which allowed her to move to the United States to join the Pediatric Neuroimaging Research Consortium at the Cincinnati Children's Research Foundation for her post-doctoral research. There, she utilized advanced neuroimaging tools, including functional MRI (fMRI), Diffusion Tensor Imaging (DTI), and Electroencephalography (EEG), to better understand the role of executive functions in reading disabilities in children. During her time in Cincinnati, Dr. Horowitz-Kraus co-established and developed the Reading and Literacy Discovery Center, where she served as Program Director (2012-2015) and Scientific Director (2012-2021).

Currently, at the Technion, Horowitz-Kraus employs advanced neuroimaging tools to better understand the role of executive functions in reading disabilities in children. Her work aims to develop more effective interventions for these disabilities.

Research and Publications

Horowitz-Kraus's research centers on the role of executive functions in reading, reading acquisition, and language processing across various populations, employing both cognitive and neuroimaging methods. She uses neuroimaging tools to explore the impact of genetic and environmental factors on the development of reading skills, framed within the Simple View of Reading model. Her work includes studies on children with or at risk for reading difficulties, such as dyslexia, attention deficits, psychiatric and neurological conditions, and those exposed to high levels of screen time or neglect..

Currently, she is the principal investigator of an R01 study funded by the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, which examines the role of executive functions in reading and reading remediation.

Horowitz-Kraus has authored and co-authored numerous influential research articles in pediatric neuroimaging, reading disabilities, and executive functions. Some of her notable publications include:

• "Associations between screen-based media use and brain white matter integrity in preschool-aged children" published in JAMA Pediatrics.
• "Home reading environment and brain activation in preschool children listening to stories" published in Pediatrics.
• "Brain connectivity in children is increased by the time they spend reading books and decreased by the length of exposure to screen‐based media" published in Acta Paediatrica.
• "Can the error detection mechanism benefit from training the working memory? A comparison between dyslexics and controls—an ERP study" published in PloS One.
• "Enhanced reading by training with imposed time constraint in typical and dyslexic adults" published in Nature Communications.

Her work has been widely cited, contributing significantly to the understanding and treatment of reading and learning disabilities.

Awards and Honors

In 2024, Horowitz-Kraus was awarded the prestigious Khalifa Award for Education in recognition of her significant contributions to understanding and addressing children's reading challenges. This Emirati award, presented by UAE President Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan, highlights her international impact and the collaborative potential between Israeli and Emirati educational efforts.