Physiological Bases of Acoustic LRT in Nonstutterers, Mild Stutterers, and Severe Stutterers

Abstract

The simple reaction time paradigm, incorporating a variable foreperiod, was used to investigate relative contributions of the respiratory and laryngeal systems to mild and severe stutterers' prolonged acoustic laryngeal reaction time (LRT) values. Prephonatory kinematic data were analyzed in terms of frequency of initiation, timing, and organization of events executed to attain the functional physiological targets of respiratory inflation during foreperiods and phonation onset after foreperiods. Acoustic data replicated a previously observed composite stuttering severity and foreperiod effect on stutterers' acoustic LRT values. Kinematic data revealed that, in general, the mild stutterers demonstrated delayed initiation of respiratory events and appropriate organization of respiratory and laryngeal events while the severe stutterers demonstrated delayed initiation of laryngeal events and inappropriate organization of respiratory and laryngeal events. That is, kinematic data both account for group differences in acoustic LRT values as a function of foreperiod and support the notion that differential respiratory and laryngeal deficits underly mild and severe stutterers' prolonged acoustic LRT values.

Lexical priming of function words and content words with children who do, and do not, stutter

“…Previous research has shown that adults who stutter tend to be slower than fluent speakers at initiating various speech-like movements, nonsense syllables, words, short phrases, and simple sentences (e.g. Adams & Hayden, 1976; Reich, Till & Goldsmith, 1981; Watson & Alfonso, 1987; Logan, 2003).…”

The need for self‐report data in the assessment of stuttering therapy efficacy: repetitions and prolongations of speech. The stuttering syndrome

“…Numerous experimental investigations have provided evidence to support the above statements. For example, Watson and Alfonso (1987) described subperceptual forms of stuttering at the acoustic level as certain irregularities such as isolated pitch pulses before continuous phonation. Using these criteria, they eliminated 22% of supposedly 'perceptually fluent' tokens of phonation before a reaction time task for mild stutterers and 27% of supposedly 'perceptually fluent' tokens of phonation for severe stutterers.…”