Why do most people function below an age appropriate auditory processing level?
Our society is very visually oriented. We are inundated day and night by visual stimuli such as billboards, TV’s, video games, computers, etc. In this day and age, people rarely JUST listen to anything. As a society, listening skills have dramatically decreased since the invention of the TV. Children and adults alike would rather watch TV or a video than listen to a story tape or read a book. Due to this lack of interest in just listening, we are losing the ability to listen. This effects our lives, and our children’s lives in many, many different ways such as picking up on social cues, following a conversation, reading comprehension skills, following directions, attending, the ability to read with the phonetic approach, and many other skills needed to be successful in school and life. Behavior is also greatly influenced by one’s auditory functioning. Does a person’s low processing level mean that a person has low intelligence? No. A person can be very intelligent and yet struggle with
