Frequency Of Disfluencies Research Articles

Influence of reading level difficulty on the disfluencies of normal children.

This study assessed the effect of increasing the difficulty of reading material on the frequency and type of disfluency in the oral reading of normally fluent elementary school children. Eighty children participated in the study. Ten boys and 10 girls each, from Grades 3, 4, 5, and 6, read five 200-word passages, corresponding to one grade below their school placement, the grade of their school placement, and one, two, and three grades above their school placement. Results indicated a significant increase in total moments of disfluency and four specific types of disfluency as the difficulty of reading material increased. The data revealed a tendency for "stuttering" disfluencies to increase more in frequency than "normal" nonfluencies. Results are discussed with respect to theoretical and experimental implications.

An analysis of the fluency patterns of institutionalized retarded adults

The fluency patterns of 32 institutionalized, mentally retarded adults previously labeled as “stutterers” were compared to the patterns of 10 severely retarded adults not diagnosed as “stutterers,” and to the descriptions of normally disfluent children and normally intelligent adult stutterers. Results indicated that retarded subjects of both groups were more comparable to each other than to developmentally disfluent children or stuttering adults of normal intelligence. There was a nonsignificant correlation between frequency and severity of disfluency. Therapeutic implications are discussed.

The frequency of disfluencies during phonatory transitions in stuttered and nonstuttered speech

The hypothesis that stuttering and nonstuttering adults have fewer disfluencies during voiced-voiced phoneme-to-phoneme phonatory transitions than during voiced-voiceless, voiceless-voiced, or voiceless-voiceless transitions was investigated. The speech of 11 adult stutterers and a matched group of nonstutterers was analyzed according to the occurence of disfluencies during the above categories of phonatory transitions. Each subject's speech was recorded individually while reading several passages. The percentage of disfluencies varied significantly ( p < 0.001) across the four phonatory transition categories for both groups of subjects. Both stutterers and nonstutterers demonstrated a lower percentage of disfluencies during voiced-voiced transitions than during voiced-voiceless, voiceless-voiced, and voiceless-voiceless phonatory transitions. Furthermore, both groups of subjects demonstrated a similar distribution of disfluencies across the four phonatory transition categories. An inability to successfully complete phoneme-to-phoneme phonatory transitions does not appear to fully explain the pattern of disfluencies for stuttering or nonstuttering adults.

Effect of threat of shock for being disfluent of fluency of normal speakers.

Each of 20 adult nonstutterers read a 330-word passage six times with a one minute pause between readings. Between the third and fourth reading or the fifth and sixth reading (determined by a table of random numbers) Ss were informed that at the conclusion of the next reading an electric shock would be administered for each instance of disfluency detected by E during that reading. Ss did not become less fluent as a consequence of the experimental condition. Their mean disfluency frequency during the threat-of-shock reading was lower than during the preceding one. Thus, threat of shock for being disfluent may be a condition which differentiates stutterers from nonstutterers since stutterers have been reported to become less fluent under this condition.

The effects of three levels of auditory masking on selected vocal characteristics and the frequency of disfluency of adult stutterers.

This study was designed to test the hypothesis that the growth function of the masking effect in stuttering behavior is promoted by systematic increases in vocal intensity. Sixteen normal-hearing adult stutterers read aloud in four conditions (quiet and 10-, 50-, and 90-dB sensation levels of continuous white noise). The oral readings were tape recorded. The recorded data were analyzed later to quantify subjects' vocal intensity, stuttering frequency, and reading time in each condition. The results showed that under various levels of masking, there is an inverse relationship between vocal intensity and stuttering frequency. The results of reading time comparisons between conditions were affected by the absolute frequency of stuttering in quiet or the magnitude of the masking effect or both. Finally, changes in vocal intensity were translated into physiological terms and then interpreted in light of how they might promote fluency and reduce stuttering.

Disfluency of nonstuttering children in relation to specific measures of language, reading, and mental maturity

Speech samples from 92 first-grade children were quantified on the basis of disfluency types and judges' ratings of language level. Intelligence and reading scores were also obtained for each subject. Correlational analysis indicated that the measures of language performance, intelligence, and reading ability used in this study were not highly and significantly associated with frequency of disfluency whether considered by individual type, type combinations, or total disfluency.

The grammatical factor in childhood disfluency in relation to the continuity hypothesis.

The relationship between grammatical function and disfluency was investigated in 15 normal-speaking children aged three years 11 months to four years 10 months. Pronouns and conjunctions appeared in significantly greater proportion among the subjects' disfluent words than among their total words. On the other hand, nouns, verbs, and prepositions had a significantly low frequency of disfluency. In many respects, the results were similar to those previously found for preschool stutterers, though a notable difference occurred in the case of verbs. The findings were interpreted to be in general accord with the hypothesis that a continuity exists between early stuttering and certain forms of normal childhood disfluency.

The influence of preschoolers' speech usage on their disfluency frequency.

A relationship between the function of speech usage and disfluency as it interacts with the speaking situation was hypothesized to explain a previously observed situational difference in preschoolers' frequency of disfluency. To test this hypothesis, speech samples collected from 10 preschoolers in their nursery school classroom and in a structured interview were subjected to a functional analysis. The results revealed that the function of the children’s language usage influenced the frequency of their disfluency.

Do all stutterers adapt?

Data are reported which indicate that some stutterers consistently increase rather than decrease their frequency of disfluency during successive trials of an adaptation task. These data were derived from the performance of a moderately severe stutterer on an adaptation task involving the use of the telephone.

Spontaneous recovery of nonstutterers' disfluency following adaptation.

Each of 18 sixth-grade nonstutterers and each of 20 adult nonstutterers read a passage five times consecutively at the same hour on two successive days. The mean frequency of disfluency during each reading of the passage was determined for the subjects in each study. While the subjects in both studies exhibited the adaptation effect the first day, in neither study did they evince spontaneous recovery the second day comparable to that reported for stutterers. Several implications are discussed.

Disfluent Speech Behavior of Preschool Children, High School Seniors, and Geriatric Persons

This investigation ascertained the types and frequency of disfluencies exhibited in the spontaneous speech of three groups of 15 nonstuttering subjects: preschool children, high school seniors, and geriatric persons. Occurrences of types of disfluencies were identified from tape recordings of subjects' responses to CAT cards. The results indicated not only that geriatric and preschool subjects exhibited similar disfluency patterns, but that frequency of occurrence of disfluencies was significantly greater in these two groups than in the high school group.

The effect of auditory masking on the fluency of normal speakers.

The effect of masking noise on the disfluency frequency of 20 adult nonstutterers was investigated. The majority of the subjects became more fluent under this condition. This suggests that an increase in fluency when speaking in the presence of masking noise does not differentiate stutterers from normal speakers.

Variations in normal speech disfluencies.

College adults were asked to speak in each of three situations. All 40 subjects started in an Alone situation in which they simply talked spontaneously about any topic while sitting alone in a room. They then participated in a situation in which they were asked to speak alone in front of a TV camera and lights, or as if to an audience (Audience-TV situation). Finally, the experimenter entered the room and engaged the subject in casual Conversation for the final situation. Each situation was 12 minutes and was tape recorded. After the last session, the subjects filled out a brief questionnaire in which they rated each situation according to their judgment of the need to speak carefully and of their estimated disfluency in the situation. The most significant finding is that subjects were most disfluent in those situations they rated as least important. Contrary to usual observations, the greatest frequency of disfluencies occurred in the Conversation rather than the Audience-TV situation. It appeared that as subjects became more concerned about their speech, they monitored it more carefully and thus became more fluent.

Generality of disfluency data collected from preschoolers.

Tape-recorded speech samples were collected from 10 four-year-old boys, both in their preschool classroom and in a structured interview on each of three days spaced one week apart. The frequency and duration of disfluency were computed for each sample. While the distribution of disfluency types and duration (extent) of disfluency were comparable in the two situations, considerably more disfluency was observed in the structured interview. The magnitude of the systematic situational difference in disfluency frequency suggests that it is risky to assume that a sample of disfluency elicited in a structured interview is representative of the behavior in other, more natural situations.

Situational variability of preschoolers' disfluency: preliminary study.

To determine whether preschoolers' disfluency systematically varies as a function of speaking situation, tape-recorded speech samples were obtained from 3 4-yr.-old nonstutterers in 3 different speaking situations, i.e., in a preschool classroom during free play, in a testing room while they performed certain speaking tasks, and in their homes talking with family members. Comparison of the situations showed that frequency of disfluency systematically varied across situations. This leads to the conclusion that sampling preschoolers' disfluency in only one situation is inadequate for most purposes.

The influence of the onset of phonation on the frequency of stuttering.

To test the hypothesis that the frequency with which vocalization must be initiated in a given speech segment and the frequency of attendant disfluency are positively related, two passages were constructed. One passage was composed entirely of voiced speech sounds (all-voiced passage). The other contained both voiceless and voiced sounds (combined passage). Thus, in reading the later material, subjects had to effect more “off-on” phonatory adjustments than in the all-voiced selection. Aside from this difference, the passages were closely matched along several other linguistic and phonetic parameters. Fourteen stutterers performed five massed oral readings of each passage. Statistical analyses all showed that there was significantly less stuttering and more rapid adaptation associated with the all-voiced material.

Distribution of instances of disfluency in consecutive readings of different passages by nonstutterers.

Fourteen adult male nonstutterers read five passages. The order in which the passages were read was randomly determined for each subject. The mean number of instances of disfluency during each of the five readings was computed. As a group, the subjects did not exhibit the adaptation effect. Their mean frequency of disfluency increased from the first to the third reading, after which it decreased. This suggests that the nature of the material read exerts a similar influence upon the course of nonstutterers' adaptation as it has been shown to exert upon the course of stutterers, adapation. Several implications are discussed.

The Effect of the Verbal Stimulus Words Wrong, Right , and Tree on the Disfluency Rates of Stutterers and Nonstutterers

The effects of the verbally presented stimuli wrong, right, and tree on the frequency of disfluencies during oral reading for 14 stutterers and 14 nonstutterers were studied. No differences were fo...

A note on the degree of adaptation by stutterers and nonstutterers during oral reading.

Group adaptation data reported for stutterers and for nonstutterers in three studies were reanalyzed using a proportional adaptation measure. In none of the studies did the stutterers adapt proportionally to a greater degree than the nonstutterers. This suggests that the greater slope observed for stutterers' than for nonstutterers' adaptation curves in these studies was primarily a function of the difference between groups in frequency of disfluency.

Disfluency behavior of elementary-school stutterers and nonstutterers: the consistency effect.

Each of 184 kindergarten through sixth-grade children, 92 stutterers and 92 matched nonstutterers, performed a speaking task two times consecutively. The kindergarten and first-grade children repeated a series of sentences, and the second- through sixth-grade children read a passage. The consistency effect was observed in both groups. However, it was exhibited by a higher percentage of the stutterers than of the nonstutterers. This difference could be at least partially accounted for by the fact that the stutterers' median frequency of disfluency on the first performance of the task was much higher than that of the nonstutterers. Several implications are discussed.