If you're a reader who empathizes with the shark in the meme, you might be a person with Auditory Processing Disorder (APD). Though the occurrence of APD is 2-7% of the population, at least 50% of those who have adhd also have APD—though my own estimate is much higher. What is the experience of having APD?
The shark in the meme above is crying out because two Orca's are talking to it at the same time. For those with APD—and I am one of them—you know that being subjected to competing auditory sources of information can produce all sorts of difficult emotional states. For many, the immediate emotional state can be anger or frustration or irritation. And unlike the meme, it doesn't have to be two people talking at the same time. For me, I experience regularly when watching TV or movies with someone who talks at the same time that characters on screen are talking.
Importantly, this is not an issue related to your body's capacity to hear. This is not a hearing problem. This is an information processing problem. I am reminded of a young woman that I saw many years ago: one of her primary complaints was that she believed she had a hearing disorder, because she reported that in certain circumstances, her hearing would, for lack of a better description, simply drop out. When she went to the audiologist, her hearing screen came back completely normal. Her physiology of hearing was fine. So... why, in certain circumstances, couldn't she hear properly?
It turned out that the circumstances of her altered hearing was in the exact circumstances the meme above represents. When there were competing streams of auditory data, her brain decided to throw out both data streams. Her experience of such environments was silence. Unlike some who experience the competing streams of auditory data as irritation, her brain decides that she doesn't need to hear any of it. But this also demonstrates that the same phenomenon—here APD—can produce radically different experiences.
APD is not a thing for which there is cure in the form of a pill. APD is a way in which your brain interprets a particular sensory domain of the world, i.e. the auditory part of the world. APD gets better when the environments in which you exist takes into consideration your form of auditory processing. It is important to say the following: this is not a moral failing. This is not volitional. This is not the kind of thing for which you can grit your teeth and power through.
Whether you are a child in school or an adult in the workplace, there are ways of altering your environment that can be helpful. For some people, it will be important to have an intervention such as noise cancelling headphones to simply help with loudness. Noise cancelling earbuds and headphones have been an absolute godsend for me personally, because I experience the world as extremely loud and irritatingly noisy. But some environmental fixes can be completely non-technical. For instance, children with APD likely do better at the front of the class so their teacher is louder relative to the background noise of the class. And simply letting friends and family and colleagues know that you struggle with APD can help to offer them some information about how you do best. There are no cures or silver bullets or magical technical fixes.
- Recognizing these sorts of difficulties is the first step.
- The next is to accept that this how your brain processes the auditory world.
- The final step is to then design environments for yourself to whatever extent you can that takes seriously and supports the wellbeing of a person like you.
