What do you do when someone can't block out background noise?

[rafiki]

.

[Misty]

He may need an eval at a speech & hearing clinic. My daughter was diagnosed with figure-ground auditory processing disorder, which is the inability to filter out background noise. She hears EVERYTHING and can't hone in the one voice she is supposed to be listening to.. even if it's much louder. She went through 8 weeks of therapy at the same clinic that diagnosed her.

 

They also recommended to me to use Earobics at home.

[Crimson Wife]

Has he been tested for CAPD? If not, I would find a good AudD. who has experience doing CAPD testing.

 

Be forewarned that if the child is 2E, the giftedness may allow him/her to compensate somewhat and score at the low end of the normal range. Unfortunately, the current CAPD tests don't have any way for the tester to adjust for use with a high IQ kid. There just isn't enough data available on the normal variations in the gifted to determine a cutoff above the overall population cutoff even if in actuality one is probably warranted.

[chepyl]

I have this problem, so does my dad. He has an official diagnosis, I do not. What helps me is continual noise. I know it sounds strange, but if I sit at a quiet table to work, I hear every sound around me and cannot tune them out, but if I turn on music or a tv show I have seen several times, I can focus better. It drives dh crazy. My dad does the same thing. He always need the tv on.

 

But, I cannot carry on a conversation in a crowded place or with the tv/radio on. Dh will turn on the radio In the car and then try to talk. I can't do it. But I can sit in the noise and focus on the computer, the dishes, or a book. Interrupt me to talk and I start feeling the stress build.

[Carol in Cal.]

White noise might help. That means a CD of waves on a beach or something similar. What it does is raise the threshhold for focussing on the other random noises that are not continuous.

[Barbara H]

CAPD testing was also my thought. Especially for a gifted kid I'd want to find an audiologist with a lot of experience in auditory processing.

[Oceana]

all of the above suggestions are all fantastic

 

However the kids noise cancelling headphones are worth a million times what I paid for them.