Nonverbal Learn Disability

Many of you have seen my post on facebook about my recent diagnoses of asperger syndrome. I'm not 100% sure but I think I also have another disorder called Nonverbal Learning Disability(NLD) which is not yet recognized by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of mental disorders.

Here's what I've read about it so far. Nonverbal Learning Disability is caused by right hemispheric brain dysfunction (damage to the right side of the brain). The right side is responsible for for visual spatial processing, which in turn is responsible for interpreting nonverbal behavior of others. The right brain is also responsible for stringing together bits and pieces of sensory data from the 5 senses and turning those details into a main idea (common sense). Common sense refers to the ability to synthesize the sensory input from 5 senses and simultaneously interpret the data from those senses. In other words people with NLD have trouble taking in everything at once and might apear to lack common sense.

The left brain, responsible for details, excels for people with NLD and tends to over compensate for the deficits of the right brain. The person with NLD becomes proficient with rote learning and memorization but temds to struggle with mathematics and science. People with NLD (unlike many people with aspergers and high functioning autism) temd to be auditory learners.

--Nick Dubin author of
Aspergers Syndrome And Anxiety
A Guide to Successful Stress Management