Comparison of speech motor development in stutterers and fluent speakers between 7 and 12 years old

doi:10.1016/0094-730X(94)00011-H

Journal of Fluency Disorders

Volume 20, Issue 3, September 1995, Pages 243-255

https://doi.org/10.1016/0094-730X(94)00011-H Get rights and content

Abstract

Though there is a growing body of research data on articulatory concomitants of stuttering in adults, little evidence has appeared to date on children who stutter. In the current study, a comparison is made between fluent children and stuttering children in three tasks. The tasks were chosen to cover a range of abilities deemed necessary for producing fluent speech. These are (a) production of voiced plosives varying in place of articulation, (b) moving the lower lip to follow the movement of a sinusoidally-varying target, and (c) making the minimum possible articulatory movement either with or without attendant visual feedback. The tasks are indicative of (a) laryngeal/supraglottal coordination, (b) supraglottal movement alone, and (c) use of kinesthetic feedback. The stutterers (a) produced longer voice onsets in the plosives, (b) had larger tracking errors, and (c) produced bigger minimal movements when no visual feedback was provided compared with fluent speakers.

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Cited by (10)

Dissociated Development of Speech and Limb Sensorimotor Learning in Stuttering: Speech Auditory-motor Learning is Impaired in Both Children and Adults Who Stutter
2020, Neuroscience
Citation Excerpt :
The acuity of sensory processing itself during and after movement execution also warrants further investigation. Despite multiple reports of reduced oral somatosensory acuity in individuals who stutter (Archibald and De Nil, 1999; De Nil and Abbs, 1991; Howell et al., 1995; Loucks and De Nil, 2006a, 2006b; although see Daliri et al., 2013), auditory acuity for the detection of unpredictable, within-trial formant frequency perturbations was reported to not differ between stuttering and nonstuttering participants (Cai et al., 2012). However, the isolated vowel productions tested in the latter study were substantially longer (∼300 ms in duration) than those occurring in connected speech, and this additional time may have been beneficial for stuttering speakers to detect the formant changes.
Stuttering is a neurodevelopmental disorder of speech fluency. Various experimental paradigms have demonstrated that affected individuals show limitations in sensorimotor control and learning. However, controversy exists regarding two core aspects of this perspective. First, it has been claimed that sensorimotor learning limitations are detectable only in adults who stutter (after years of coping with the disorder) but not during childhood close to the onset of stuttering. Second, it remains unclear whether stuttering individuals’ sensorimotor learning limitations affect only speech movements or also unrelated effector systems involved in nonspeech movements. We report data from separate experiments investigating speech auditory-motor learning (N = 60) and limb visuomotor learning (N = 84) in both children and adults who stutter versus matched nonstuttering individuals. Both children and adults who stutter showed statistically significant limitations in speech auditory-motor adaptation with formant-shifted feedback. This limitation was more profound in children than in adults and in younger children versus older children. Between-group differences in the adaptation of reach movements performed with rotated visual feedback were subtle but statistically significant for adults. In children, even the nonstuttering groups showed limited visuomotor adaptation just like their stuttering peers. We conclude that sensorimotor learning is impaired in individuals who stutter, and that the ability for speech auditory-motor learning—which was already adult-like in 3–6 year-old typically developing children—is severely compromised in young children near the onset of stuttering. Thus, motor learning limitations may play an important role in the fundamental mechanisms contributing to the onset of this speech disorder.
Motor practice effects and sensorimotor integration in adults who stutter: Evidence from visuomotor tracking performance
2015, Journal of Fluency Disorders
Citation Excerpt :
In the present study visual feedback was always available to participants during both jaw and hand tracking tasks, which may have influenced performance of PWS and PWNS to a different degree. Prior work has shown that children (Howell, Sackin, & Rustin, 1995) and adults who stutter (Archibald & De Nil, 1999; Loucks & De Nil, 2006) performed as well as people who do not stutter in non-speech jaw movement task when visual feedback was available, and significantly less accurate in the absence of visual feedback. Researchers have theorized that the relative inaccuracy of jaw movements shown by children who stutter and adults who stutter in the absence of visual feedback may be explained by aberrant proprioceptive integration, suggesting an oral kinesthetic deficit (Archibald & De Nil, 1999; Loucks & De Nil, 2006; Loucks, De Nil, & Sasisekaran, 2007; cf. Namasivayam, van Lieshout, McIlroy, & De Nil, 2009).
The purpose of this study was to utilize a visuomotor tracking task, with both the jaw and hand, to add to the literature regarding non-speech motor practice and sensorimotor integration (outside of auditory-motor integration domain) in adults who do (PWS) and do not (PWNS) stutter.
Participants were 15 PWS (14 males, mean age = 27.0) and 15 PWNS (14 males, mean age = 27.2). Participants tracked both predictable and unpredictable moving targets separately with their jaw and their dominant hand, and accuracy was assessed by calculating phase and amplitude difference between the participant and the target. Motor practice effect was examined by comparing group performance over consecutive tracking trials of predictable conditions as well as within the first trial of same conditions.
Results showed that compared to PWNS, PWS were not significantly different in matching either the phase (timing) or the amplitude of the target in both jaw and hand tracking of predictable and unpredictable targets. Further, there were no significant between-group differences in motor practice effects for either jaw or hand tracking. Both groups showed improved tracking accuracy within and between the trials.
Our findings revealed no statistically significant differences in non-speech motor practice effects and integration of sensorimotor feedback between PWS and PWNS, at least in the context of the visuomotor tracking tasks employed in the study. In general, both talker groups exhibited practice effects (i.e., increased accuracy over time) within and between tracking trials during both jaw and hand tracking. Implications for these results are discussed.
Educational Objectives: The reader will be able to: (a) describe the importance of motor learning and sensory-motor integration for speech, (b) summarize past research on PWS's performance during speech and nonspeech motor tasks, and (c) describe the relation between different aspects of speech and non-speech motor control and stuttering.
Sequence skill learning in persons who stutter: Implications for cortico-striato-thalamo-cortical dysfunction
2007, Journal of Fluency Disorders
The basal ganglia and cortico-striato-thalamo-cortical connections are known to play a critical role in sequence skill learning and increasing automaticity over practice. The current paper reviews four studies comparing the sequence skill learning and the transition to automaticity of persons who stutter (PWS) and fluent speakers (PNS) over practice. Studies One and Two found PWS to have poor finger tap sequencing skill and nonsense syllable sequencing skill after practice, and on retention and transfer tests relative to PNS. Studies Three and Four found PWS to be significantly less accurate and/or significantly slower after practice on dual tasks requiring concurrent sequencing and colour recognition over practice relative to PNS. Evidence of PWS’ deficits in sequence skill learning and automaticity development support the hypothesis that dysfunction in cortico-striato-thalamo-cortical connections may be one etiological component in the development and maintenance of stuttering.
Educational objectives: As a result of this activity, the reader will: (1) be able to articulate the research regarding the basal ganglia system relating to sequence skill learning; (2) be able to summarize the research on stuttering with indications of sequence skill learning deficits; and (3) be able to discuss basal ganglia mechanisms with relevance for theory of stuttering.
Involvement of the Cortico-Basal Ganglia-Thalamocortical Loop in Developmental Stuttering
2020, Frontiers in Psychology
Control and prediction components of movement planning in stuttering versus nonstuttering adults
2014, Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research
Afferent and efferent aspects of mandibular sensorimotor control in adults who stutter
2013, Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research

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^☆: This research was supported by the Wellcome Trust. Thanks are due to Jim Chambers (Psychology Department, University College London) for constructing the apparatus.

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Comparison of speech motor development in stutterers and fluent speakers between 7 and 12 years old☆

Abstract

Trends in Neurosciences

A strain gauge transduction system for lip and jaw motion in two dimensions: Design criteria and calibration data

Journal of Speech and Hearing Research

Compensatory responses to low magnitude loads applied to the lower lip during speech

Journal of the Acoustical Society of America

Control of complex motor gestures: Orofacial muscle responses to load perturbations of lip during speech

Journal of Neuropsychology

Control of multimovement coordination: Sensorimotor mechanisms in speech motor programming

Journal of Motor Behavior

Implications of the concepts underlying task-dynamic modeling on kinematic studies of stuttering

A new head-mounted, lip-jaw movement transduction system for the study of motor speech disorders

Journal of Speech and Hearing Research

Selected temporal aspects of coordination during fluent speech of young stutterers

Journal of Speech and Hearing Research

Oral and finger kinesthetic thresholds in stutterers

Lip and jaw motor control during speech: Responses to resistive loading of the jaw

Journal of Speech and Hearing Research