Stuttering severity and responses to social-communicative challenge in preschool-age children who stutter

Abstract

PurposeThis study assessed indices of autonomic arousal and vocal tension during challenge in preschool-age children who do stutter (CWS) and do not stutter (CWNS).MethodParticipants were preschool-age CWS (n = 10) and gender- and age-matched CWNS (n = 10) who performed in two speaking conditions: (1) ‘low’ challenge – naming age-appropriate pictures in a familiar room with the same examiner who administered his/her speech-language prescreening test (2) ‘high’ challenge – recalling the pictures named in condition (1) in a different room with an unfamiliar examiner while wearing acoustic startle electrodes on his/her face. Immediately following the ‘high’ challenge speaking task, the participants’ acoustic startle eyeblink response (ASEB) was measured. Dependent variables were ASEB in the ‘high’ challenge condition and the acoustic measure of mean fundamental frequency (Fo) in both challenge conditions.ResultsFindings indicated no significant between-group (CWS vs. CWNS) differences in Fo or ASEB responses. However, CWS-severe (n = 5), when compared with CWS-mild/moderate (n = 5), exhibited a statistically significant increase in Fo in the ‘high’ challenge relative to the ‘low’ challenge condition.ConclusionsResults were taken to suggest that preschool-age CWS-severe exhibit vocal tension while speaking in conditions of social (e.g. speaking to unfamiliar examiner) and communicative (e.g. recalling from memory names of pictures previously shown) challenge, and such vocal behavior is possibly associated with this subgroup's difficulty establishing normally fluent speech.