The phonologic dyslexic is more likely to have problems with nonwords or unfamiliar words and the diagnosis is usually based on poor performance on a standardized test of phonology. If possible, it would be helpful to know how the diagnosis of dyslexia was made and whether the child is characterized as a phonologic or deep dyslexic or a comprehension or surface dyslexic. Typical complaints may include poor listening skills, easy distractibility, inability to learn new words or to sound out words in reading, inattentiveness, and difficulty with following auditory directions. Based on the symptoms presented through the information gathered from parents, teachers and other specialists, the audiologist can structure the battery of tests to assess the auditory deficits that the behavior describes. When a dyslexic child is referred to the audiologist to be evaluated for an auditory processing disorder, the audiologist will likely use a battery of tests that utilize both simple auditory stimuli such as tones, clicks, and noise bursts and complex stimuli such as speech. Orton recognized that the impairment was not related to absolute acuity in either the visual or auditory domain (these kids had normal hearing and vision when tested), but rather in the processing of information through the visual or auditory system. Neither of the definitions addresses the source of the disability, however, but a pioneer in reading disabilities (Orton, 1937) suggested that perceptual impairments either in the auditory or visual domain, or both, were at the root of developmental reading disorders. What both of these definitions describe is a child with disabilities in the processing and acquisition of language in spite of normal intelligence, normal hearing, normal vision, no known neurological impairments or deficits, and appropriate educational opportunities. In spite of many efforts to more accurately define dyslexia, there are still a number of conflicting opinions and multiple sources of misinformation that make it difficult for parents and teachers to fully understand the nature of the reading disorder.ĭyslexia is defined by the International Dyslexia Association (2000) as a “language-based disability in which a person has trouble understanding words, sentences or paragraphs both oral and written language are affected.” An earlier definition, formulated by a dyslexia research committee with the National Institutes of Health added that the disorder was “characterized by difficulties in single word decoding, usually reflecting insufficient phonological processing abilities” that are “often unexpected in relation to age and other cognitive and academic abilities” (Shaywitz, Fletcher & Shaywitz, 1994). Others try to make a distinction between auditory processing problems and dyslexia on the basis of the commonly held notion that dyslexia is based primarily on the visual reversal of letters during reading. Many parents are confused about what dyslexia is and often express frustration that the symptoms appear to be indistinguishable from those that describe an auditory processing disorder.
A good example of this problem is the referral of children with dyslexia. Today, there is an increasing demand on the audiologist to provide a useful clinical battery for diagnosing auditory processing disorders in children under standard audiological testing conditions.īecause many of the children referred to the audiologist experience difficulties in addition to the listening problems characteristic of an auditory processing disorder, it is important that parents and audiologists begin to understand and separate the symptoms commonly found in different disorders. While the methods used by these specialists did indicate that a number of children had auditory processing difficulties, it has become clear that more stringently controlled procedures typically used by audiologists might yield better results. In the past, children with these problems were evaluated by educational specialists, speech-language pathologists, neurologists, psychologists and psychiatrists. More and more children with learning and reading disabilities are being referred to the audiologist for a hearing and an auditory processing evaluation.
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