What is auditory processing disorder?

What is auditory processing disorder? A group of friends sitting outside having a picnic and conversation.

At a glance

  • Auditory processing disorder (APD) makes it hard to know what people are saying.

  • It isn’t related to hearing problems or intelligence.

  • APD can impact people of all ages, and in different ways.

Auditory processing disorder (APD) is a term that refers to problems in how the brain understands speech. The sounds may be loud and clear. But people with APD don’t pick up on the subtle differences between them. 

For example, they may not recognize the difference between cat, that, and bat. The words seventy and seventeen may sound the same. Words can also get scrambled, so the question “how are the chair and couch alike” might sound like “how a cow and hair are like.”

There are four auditory processing skills that people may struggle with:

  • Auditory discrimination: noticing, comparing, and distinguishing between separate sounds

  • Auditory figure-ground discrimination: focusing on the important sounds in a noisy setting

  • Auditory memory: recalling what you’ve heard, either immediately or in the future

  • Auditory sequencing: understanding and recalling the order of sounds and words

APD can have an impact on learning and interacting with others. But it isn’t related to intelligence. People with APD are as smart as anyone else. They just struggle with a specific group of skills. 

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