Recognizing and Treating Children with Central Auditory Processing Disorders

Children and adults who have central auditory processing disorder (CAPD) are a heterogeneous group of people who have difficulty using auditory information to communicate and learn. CAPD is not a specific problem or disease; rather it is a set of problems that occur in different kinds of listening tasks. Often children with CAPD are first diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) or learning disabilities. Later, an audiologist may render a diagnosis of CAPD. To audiologists, CAPD includes problems with one or more of the following auditory tasks (ASHA CAPD Task Force, 1996): • Sound localization and lateralization • Auditory discrimination • Auditory pattern recognition • Temporal aspects of audition (resolution, masking, integration, ordering) • Auditory performance decrements with competing acoustic signals • Auditory performance with degraded acoustic signals Audiologists make the diagnosis using standardized tests of these skills administered i