Stuttering-Causes, Types and Therapy

Stuttering is a communication problem in which spoken words or sounds are involuntarily repeated, drawn out, not completed, or skipped. Stuttering is not unusual in young children between ages 2 and 7 years. Stuttering that begins during a child''s intensive language-learning years and resolves on its own sometime before puberty is called normal disfluency.

Stuttering is a communication problem in which spoken words or sounds are involuntarily repeated, drawn out, not completed, or skipped. Stuttering is not unusual in young children between ages 2 and 7 years. Stuttering that begins during a child''s intensive language-learning years and resolves on its own sometime before puberty is called normal disfluency. It is considered a normal phase of language development. Developmental stuttering is a speech problem that persists, gets worse over time, and causes embarrassment or discomfort.

Stuttering affects the fluency of speech. It begins during childhood and, in some cases, lasts throughout life. The disorder is characterized by disruptions in the production of speech sounds, also called "disfluencies." Most people produce brief disfluencies from time to time. For instance, some words are repeated and others are preceded by "um" or "uh." Disfluencies are not necessarily a problem; however, they can impede communication when a person produces too many of them.

Types

Developmental stuttering evolves before puberty, usually between two and five years of age, without apparent brain damage or other known cause ("idiopathic"). It is important to distinguish between this persistent developmental stuttering (PDS), which we focus on here, and acquired stuttering. Neurogenic or acquired stuttering occurs after a definable brain damage, e.g., stroke, intracerebral hemorrhage, or head trauma. It is a rare phenomenon that has been observed after lesions in a variety of brain areas.

Neurogenic stuttering is a type of fluency disorder in which a person has difficulty in producing speech in a normal, smooth fashion. Individuals with fluency disorders may have speech that sounds fragmented or halting, with frequent interruptions and difficulty producing words without effort or struggle. Neurogenic stuttering typically appears following some sort of injury or disease to the central nervous system i.e. the brain and spinal cord, including cortex, subcortex, cerebellar, and even the neural pathway regions.

The growing consensus is that many factors influence stuttering. Current theories suggest that it arises due to a combination of several genetic and environmental influences. Some elements currently being examined include motor skills, language skills, and temperament. It is presumed that a child experiences disruptions in speech production due to an interaction among these (and presumably other) factors.

Stuttering may also occur with repetitive gestures or unusual mannerisms, such as exaggerated blinking or tension around the mouth. This is more likely to occur when stuttering is severe or getting worse. These symptoms often indicate that the speaker is aware of and embarrassed by his or her stuttering.

What causes stuttering?
The exact mechanical causes of stuttering are not completely understood, but it is thought to be a hereditary condition.

Who stutters?

It is estimated that over three million Americans stutter. Stuttering affects individuals of all ages but occurs most frequently in young children between the ages of 2 and 6 who are developing language. Boys are three times more likely to stutter than girls. Most children, however, outgrow their stuttering, and it is estimated that less than 1 percent of adults stutter.

Stuttering Therapy

There is no cure for stuttering, but treatments for stuttering can include: Electronic devices based on the technique of choral speech or the choral effect, in which everything a stuttering person is saying is matched by another person, like people singing in a chorus or choir. Electronic devices that can be placed in a stuttering child''s ear can actually replay what the child is saying after a very brief delay, mimicking the choral effect and decreasing or even eliminating a child''s stuttering.

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