2003 IFA Congress: Montreal, Canada

Slow Rate Effect on the Fluency of Preschoolers Who Stutter: Clinician-Child Adjacent Utterances

Jennifer S. Carlson¹ and Lisa R. LASALLE^2
1Claire Santagati Vatz, M.A., C. C. C., INC., Private Practice, 250 Mt. Lebanon Blvd, Suite 41], Pittsburgh, PA 15234, USA
²University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, Communication Disorders Department, 239 Water Street, Eau Claire, WI 54702, USA

SUMMARY

The purpose of this study was to determine if clinicians’ slow speech rates facilitate fluency of preschoolers who stutter. Seven preschoolers who stutter and their clinicians served as participants. Clinicians’ speech rates were categorized into “slow” ( 3.0 syllables per second [SPS]) or “fast” ( 3.33 SPS), and the children’s adjacent utterances as “stuttered” or “normally disfluent/fluent.” As a group, observed probabilities did not differ from expected where the child either stuttered or spoke fluently, based on clinician rate of speech. One boy, however, stuttered significantly more when his clinician spoke quickly, while another boy stuttered significantly more when his clinician spoke slowly.
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