Purpose: To provide a personal perspective on auditory processing disorder (APD), with reference to the recent clinical forum on APD and the needs of clinical speech-language pathologists and audiologists. Method: The Medical Research Council-Institute of Hearing Research (MRC-IHR) has been engaged in research into APD and auditory learning for 8…

The brain mechanisms of hearing include large regions of the anterior temporal, prefrontal, and inferior parietal cortex, and an extensive network of descending connections between the cortex and sub-cortical components of what is presently known as the auditory system. One important function of these additional ("top-down") mechanisms for hearing…

Purpose: Parental reports of communication, listening, and behavior in children receiving a clinical diagnosis of specific language impairment (SLI) or auditory processing disorder (APD) were compared with direct tests of intelligence, memory, language, phonology, literacy, and speech intelligibility. The primary aim was to identify whether there…