The experience of stuttering in everyday life among adults who stutter: The impact of trait social anxiety and the social situations.

PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to investigate the emotional and stuttering experience of adults who stutter (AWS) in everyday life, and how that experience may be shaped by personal (i.e., trait social anxiety) and situational factors (i.e., social partner reaction, communication channel type, social closeness, stuttering knowledge). METHOD: AWS completed ecological momentary assessments on their smartphones multiple times a day for up to three weeks. Data (n = 62) were analyzed with multilevel models to determine how situational factors and trait social anxiety influence the Negative Affect (NA), Positive Affect (PA), and self-reported stuttering severity of AWS. RESULTS: Results indicated that having high (vs. low) trait social anxiety was associated with a tendency to experience high NA, low PA, and high self-reported stuttering severity among AWS. A range of situational factors significantly influenced the within-person variation of NA, PA, and self-reported stuttering severity in everyday life. In addition, interacting with distant social partners relative to being alone heightened NA, and the effect was more prominent among AWS with high (vs. low) trait social anxiety. CONCLUSIONS: Overall, the findings suggest that the variation of affects and stuttering severity among AWS can be partly accounted for by factors from both the situational and personal levels. Clinicians should be aware of the low PA experienced by AWS who have high (vs low) trait social anxiety in everyday life.

Effects of task variations on language productivity, syntactic complexity, and stuttering in children who stutter.

PURPOSE: The aim of this preliminary study was to compare the effects of variations in task demands on: (a) language productivity in sentences categorised into stuttered vs. non-stuttered sentences; (b) syntactic complexity in stuttered vs. non-stuttered sentence categories, and (c) stuttering and typical disfluencies in school-age children who stutter (CWS). Language Sample Analysis (LSA) was conducted on samples from three tasks - Conversation, fable retell, and critical thinking based on the fables. METHODS: Participants were 14 CWS categorised into younger (9 to 12-year-olds, n = 8) and older age groups (13 to 15-year-olds, n = 6). The Computerized Language ANalysis program was used to conduct language and disfluency analyses. Repeated measures analysis of variance and nonparametric statistical analyses were used to investigate: (a) Language productivity in total number of words and sentences by task and sentence category; (b) Syntactic complexity at the word- (use of metacognitive verbs), phrase- (use of verb phrases), and utterance (Mean Length of Utterances in words, MLUw) levels by task and sentence category; and (c) Disfluencies measured using % stuttered syllables (%SS) and % typical disfluencies (%TD). RESULTS AND CONCLUSIONS: Task effects in language productivity did not differ by sentence category and suggested limited influences of propositionality and volubility in stuttering. In contrast, higher syntactic complexity was obtained in the stuttered compared to non-stuttered sentences at the word, phrase, and utterance levels and it was the same task - conversation, that elicited the effect. Additionally, variations in task demands did not result in significant differences in %SS. The findings inform assessment planning with the selection of tasks guided by task demands and assessment requirements.

Developmental Differences in the Availability of Cognitive Resources Supporting Rhyming and Dual Tasking.

Purpose We investigated developmental differences in a dual task involving rhyming and tone judgment/decisions and the effects of varying cognitive demands on task performance. Method Participants were 7- to 11-year-olds, 12- to 15-year-olds, and adults between 18 and 40 years (n = 19 per group). The rhyming task consisted of three stimuli categories (nonrhyme, rhyme, and replica), and the tone task stimuli were presented at short (100 ms) versus long (900 ms) stimulus onset asynchrony (SOA) from the onset of the rhyme task to vary cognitive demands. Response time (RT) and error data were analyzed using linear and binomial mixed-methods analysis, respectively. Results and Conclusions Adults did not show an SOA-based effect in rhyming RT, while the 12- to 15-year-olds showed the most effect (RT, long > short SOA). Response to the replica category was significantly faster than for the other categories in all age groups. A reverse SOA effect was evident in the tone task (RT, short > long SOA) in all age groups. The 7- to 11-year-olds showed twice the task switch cost effect in the tone task RT. Age grouping and phoneme awareness were significant predictors of performance in both tasks, and additionally, SOA was a significant predictor of performance in the secondary task. The findings have implications for (a) understanding maturational differences in rhyming and executive control for dual tasking and the cognitive mechanisms supporting such effects and (b) identifying variables contributing to the developmental differences.