Trastornos de procesamiento auditivo y trastornos específicos del lenguaje: ¿los mismos o diferentes?

The auditory processing disorder (APD) is a diagnostic category specifically recognised by the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA), which has generated considerable debate, particularly as regards the differentiation of Specific Language Impairment (SLI) and dyslexia. Diagnostic tools are questioned, since in many cases acoustic stimuli of speech signals are used, and it is unclear whether the processing of these signals only involve auditory skills and not others, such as attention, memory and language processing. There is insufficient evidence to consider APD as a specific and different diagnostic category of SLI. This is due to several reasons, including that the measurements used to determine them are not exempt from linguistic and cognitive components. With regard to the intervention of auditory processing in children with SLI, there is not enough research on their effectiveness. With the information available at this time, it can be said that with this type of intervention, children with SLI improve in general auditory processing skills, although it does not improve their linguistic abilities significantly. In order to clarify this disorder, a greater biological, neurological, neuropsychological and speech therapy investigation body is required.