If your child's hearing tests have shown no hearing loss but you still find that he or she is struggling with auditory instructions, reading and other problems, you may want to talk with an audiologist, such as RI ENT Physicians Inc DBA Hearing Centers of RI, about the possibility of auditory processing disorder. Kids with auditory processing disorder have trouble understanding the things that they hear despite the fact that they are hearing clearly. Here's a look at some of the most common problems with auditory processing disorder and how it's diagnosed.

Common Auditory Processing Problems

There are a few key areas where auditory processing problems can appear. Knowing what to watch for may help you to spot the signs early. Here are the primary problem areas:

Figure-Ground Issues – kids with figure-ground problems have trouble paying attention to anything when there's ambient noise in the room. Parties, classrooms and other group environments can be difficult for these kids.

Auditory Memory Struggles – auditory memory is crucial for remembering directions, study material and lists. Sometimes, kids with auditory memory issues forget what you said right away. In other cases, they can remember it for a short time, but cannot recall it later when needed.

Auditory Discrimination Difficulties – kids who struggle with auditory discrimination may have trouble telling the difference between subtle vowel sounds or words that are similar. This can lead to difficulty with spelling, reading and writing.

Auditory Attention Loss – Some kids have trouble staying focused on what is being said long enough to finish a task. This is a common problem with school lectures, read-alouds and similar environments.

Auditory Cohesion Development – Auditory cohesion refers to higher level processing. Inferring meaning, understanding complex verbal information and decoding riddles are all part of auditory cohesion.

Diagnosing Auditory Processing Disorder

There is no single test for auditory processing issues. If you suspect that your child has problems with auditory processing, you'll need to call an audiologist for a thorough assessment. Here are some of the things the audiologist will do.

Full Hearing Screen – the first step is to rule out any degree of hearing loss. This is important, because you need to address physical hearing ability before you can correct processing problems.

Neurologic Assessment – once the audiologist has ruled out any physical hearing damage, he or she will test your child for any neurological hearing problems. This assesses how well your child's brain is responding to sounds. To do this, he or she will attach a series of electrodes that measure brain responses.

Behavioral Observation – behavioral testing involves testing your child's ability to complete a spoken word. Information will be presented orally with a portion of the words missing. Children without auditory processing disorder can typically fill in the missing information on their own to understand the sentence. Kids with processing disorders are unable to do this.

Dichotic Testing – Dichotic testing evaluates the function of both ears. The audiologist will present certain numbers or words in both ears alternately. Your child will have to repeat everything said in both ears.

After the evaluation, your audiologist can not only tell you if your child has a processing disorder, but can also provide recommendations for accommodations. The sooner you address it, the sooner you'll be able to make changes to help your child succeed.