The Stuttering Brain. Language and Motor Processing in Stuttering. Anne Smith, Ph.D., Winter 1999-2000Purdue University Everyone knows that stuttering, like many human behaviors, is complex. However, people who stutter and clinicians who treat them should be very encouraged. Recent theoretical advances and new technologies to "see" the processes underlying complex human behavior have helped us to make considerable progress in understanding stuttering. Most scientists interested in fluency agree that there is not a single cause of stuttering; rather it is the result of the interaction of several factors.
The central issue then is: how and when do these factors interact to produce stuttering? Our model starts with a simple point: to produce speech, the brain must generate sets of neural commands to produce the right amount and timing of muscle activity in a large number of muscles, including those that control breathing, voice, and oral movements. How can we test hypotheses such as these? Research in Early Childhood Stuttering. Ehud YairiUniversity of Illinois at Urbana Champaign, Winter 1999-2000 To conduct research and develop effective clinical management strategies for any disorder it is important to have reliable data regarding its general incidence and prevalence as well as the incidence in different ethnic or racial sub-populations.
The natural development and changes in symptomatology during the disorder's course, and the existence of any subtypes must be documented. This information guides differential diagnoses, prevention programs, selection of treatments for each stage of the disorder, timing of intervention, and the evaluation of treatment efficacy. Such information on early childhood stuttering has been scarce.
For many years, clinicians working with young children who stutter noticed that many preschool children outgrow stuttering without formal clinical intervention while others develop a chronic disorder. The project is unique for two reasons. Recent Developments. By Dennis Drayna, PhDNational Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders, National Institutes of HealthWinter 2002 Stuttering has long been known to cluster in families, and much evidence has accumulated that genetic factors help cause stuttering in some cases.
However, the lack of clear inheritance patterns in stuttering has made genetic studies slow and difficult. A new study recently published in the journal Nature has now established the importance of specific genes in speech disorders. A group in London led by Dr. Tony Monaco has done research that has lead to the identification of a specific gene on chromosome 7 necessary for proper speech production. This research team has been studying an unusual family, known as the KE family, in which many members are affected with a speech disorder that affects both the ability to construct proper sentence structure and also the ability to produce speech sounds. DAF in Stuttering. By Anne L. Foundas, MD Professor of Neurology, Tulane University Health Sciences CenterWinter 2005 At this juncture neuroscientists believe that developmental stuttering is a complex motor speech disorder with a strong genetic link.
Based on converging evidence from cognitive-behavioral, genetic, neurophysiological and neuroanatomical studies, we have learned that it is likely that stuttering does not result from one causative factor. Furthermore, there is increasing evidence that biological subtypes may be demonstrable with the potential that different therapies may benefit different biologically specific types of stuttering. In a series of recent studies our research group has focused on the anatomy and functional representation of the auditory system in individuals with developmental stuttering. It is well established that the dysfluencies observed in individuals who stutter may be reduced under a number of conditions including choral reading and alteredauditory feedback. References: Treating Coexisting Stuttering. Nancy E. Hall, Ph.D., Winter 1999-2000 Speech/language clinicians have reported the onset of stuttering during the course of treating a youngster's language or speech sound impairments.
Clinicians who face this dilemma must make decisions about therapy with little information to guide their decision-making. At the University of Maine, we are examining individual cases of children with communication impairments and stuttering to identify the important factors in treating these children, and to develop innovative ways of therapy. At 3 years, 6 months, Max exhibited moderate expressive/receptive language delays, and mild phonological impairment. Three months into this treatment phase, Max began stuttering, and intervention shifted to working on language while indirectly modeling easy speech, and discontinuing direct work on phonology. After two months, Max demonstrated no stuttering behavior and his parents reported positive changes in their communicative interactions with Max.