Learning disorders are neurological problems that prevent your child"s brain from understanding and processing information. Medline Plus, a service of the U.S. National Library of Medicine, states that learning disorders can affect your child"s ability to focus attention, speak and be successful in primary subject areas such as reading, writing and math. Intelligence, language and social abilities are components of your child"s normal learning and development, and one or more of these areas will be a problem if your child has a learning disorder. Each stage of your child"s development, from the prenatal stage all the way through childhood, has developmental behaviors associated with it.