Who can benefit from AIT?

Children (age 3 or older) and adults with learning difficulties, speech and language disorders, sensory issues including auditory, tactile or other sensory sensitivities (hyper or hypo), central auditory processing disorder (CAPD), dyslexia, pervasive developmental disorder (PDD), autism spectrum disorders, attention deficit disorder with or without hyperactivity, anxiety, depression, poor eye contact, distractibility, concentration problems and other areas. Specifics will be determined and discussed in the evaluation.

What is the minimum age that someone can complete AIT? Maximum age?

Dr Guy Berard recommends that the child be 3 years old and above. There is no maximum age.

Is there any research on AIT?

Around 80% of our candidates get positive benefits from AIT. There have been no reports of any long-term negative effects.

How many sessions do we need? Is this something we do just once?

There are twenty sessions to the program. Some people find one set of AIT sessions to be sufficient. In other cases, we find continued improvements with repeat sessions with parents who’ve experienced success with the therapy and excitedly anticipate their next round of AIT. Although, this will be determined in the follow-up assessments.

Which treatment should be done first?

AIT serves as an excellent precursor to other therapies and training programs as it helps normalize the brain and sensory systems, which then allows the person to use other therapies more effectively.

My child can be difficult to work with. How can I get him/her to wear the headphones?

Many children find AIT to be calming and relaxing, once they get used to wearing the headphones. So please remember to start practicing the child to wear full cup sized (around the ear headphones that are large and comfortable) headphones beforehand.

What is the difference between the DAA/AIT method and others such as Tomatis or Samonas?

DAA/AIT is the only method that has formal research substantiation with 28 clinical studies rather than purely anecdotal reports. It is a US FDA approved intervention and took 10 years for DAA/AIT to get approval from the FDA.

In general, DAA/AIT is known for helping with audiologic and neurologic related issues that can also positively impact social and emotional issues.

Tomatis like Bruno Bettelheim, believed that autism was caused by a mother and child bonding issue and so focused more on the emotional and psychological areas rather than the audiological and neurological areas which Berard focused on.

Many of the other auditory programs today are based on the Tomatis method. They also promote the idea of improvements in social and emotional issues.

We offer DAA/AIT and follow Berard recommended protocols.