Initial Syllable Vowel Duration as a Temporal Measure in Persons with Stuttering: Implication for Speech Motor Control

Abstract

Stuttering is a fluency disorder characterized by involuntary repetitions, prolongations and hesitation. “Relational Speech Timing Task (RST)” refers to a phenomenon where in, when a set of words with a common base word, is used with progressively increasing length of suffixes it results in progressive reduction in the duration of vowel of the initial syllable. Since individuals with stuttering are reported to have difficulties in the temporal aspects of speech, this study aimed to assess and compare the Initial Syllable Vowel Shortening(ISVS) among individuals with stuttering and Fluent age matched controls. Eight males with stuttering and eight age and gender matched fluent adults served as subjects. Eight sets of meaningful Tamil words were developed for the RST tasks. The subjects were asked to repeat the modelled stimuli and only the stutter free responses were taken for the analysis. The duration of the initial vowel in the words were measured and compared between the two groups. Results revealed that individuals with stuttering exhibited difficulties for multisyllabic words, demonstrating the subtle timing difficulties in individuals with stuttering.