Stopping a stutter
Some good news for stutterers as researchers at the University of Sydney find an effective way for Stopping a stutter. The basis of the treatment is:
After nine months, children in the treatment group had reduced their stuttering by 77 per cent, compared with 43 per cent of those in the control group.
The program is based on speech pathologists teaching the children's parents to praise them for not stuttering and, from time to time, when they do stutter, to ask them to repeat the sentence again.
Apparently, it is too late for people like me:
"If you finish up as an adolescent or an adult with stuttering, you will probably be affected with it for life.
"But treatment is very effective in the preschool age group."
Prof Onslow said around one in 100 adults stuttered, reducing their amount of verbal communication over a lifetime by up to three-quarters compared with the general population.
They were also at risk of being bullied during their school years, to have limited job opportunities and were highly susceptible to developing social phobia.
2 comments:
Interesting therapy.
From my understanding, therapy in the 50's and 60s was centered around ignoring the kids, and having the parents be patient with them. It sounds similar.
Also since starting my blog, PebblesUnderTheTongue.blogspot.com, I've noticed an increase in spontanious fluency. And since I started my therapy, I've had even more spontanious fluency.
I have also come to the conclusion that when you try not to stutter, it only gets worse.
Regards,
John
John,
Thank you for your kind comment.
I did speech therapy as a child. I cannot recall any of the lessons I learnt back then.
Your comment about a blog helping you to reduce stuttering is interesting. I do not think the same has happened to me. There have always been periods of fluency. I have just been glad to experience them.
But one thing that does help is teaching a class with the aid of a whiteboard. I seem to stutter very little then. It could be that I am in a comfort zone of controlling the conversation. And switching between the different motor skills of writing on a whiteboard and speaking may prevent me from getting into a rut.
Douglas
PS This is probably not a safe blog to leave your full name.
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