Beyond stuttering: Speech disfluencies in normally fluent French-speaking children at age 4

[en] The aim of this study was to establish normative data on the speech disfluencies of normally fluent French-speaking children at age 4, an age at which stuttering has begun in 95% of children who stutter (Yairi & Ambrose, 2013). Fifty monolingual French-speaking children who do not stutter participated in the study. Analyses of a conversational speech sample comprising 250–550 words revealed an average of 10% total disfluencies, 2% stuttering-like disfluencies and around 8% non-stuttered disfluencies. Possible explanations for these high speech disfluency frequencies are discussed, including explanations linked to French in particular. The results shed light on the importance of normative data specific to each language.

Disciplines :

Theoretical & cognitive psychology

Author, co-author :

Leclercq, Anne-Lise ; Université de Liège > Département de Logopédie > Logopédie clinique

Suaire, Pauline

Moyse, Astrid

Language :

English

Title :

Beyond stuttering: Speech disfluencies in normally fluent French-speaking children at age 4

Publication date :

2018

Journal title :

Clinical Linguistics and Phonetics

ISSN :

0269-9206

eISSN :

1464-5076

Publisher :

Taylor & Francis Ltd, Abingdon, United Kingdom

Volume :

Issue :

Pages :

166-179

Peer reviewed :

Peer Reviewed verified by ORBi

Available on ORBi :

since 25 August 2017

Statistics

Number of views

295 (51 by ULiège)

Number of downloads

847 (28 by ULiège)

More statistics

Scopus citations^®

Scopus citations^®
without self-citations

OpenCitations

OpenAlex citations

Bibliography

Ambrose, N. G., & Yairi, E., (1999). Normative disfluency data for early childhood stuttering. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 42, 895–909. doi:10.1044/jslhr.4204.895
Ardila, A., Ramos, E., & Barrocas, R., (2011). Patterns of stuttering in a Spanish/English bilingual: A case report. Clinical Linguistics and Phonetics, 25, 23–36. doi:10.3109/02699206.2010.510918
Boey, R., Wuyts, F., Van De Heyning, P., De Bodt, M., & Heylen, L., (2007). Characteristics of stuttering-like disfluencies in Dutch-speaking children. Journal of Fluency Disorders, 32, 310–329. doi:10.1016/j.jfludis.2007.07.003
Bortfeld, H., Leon, S. D., Bloom, J. E., Schober, M. F., & Brennan, S. E., (2001). Disfluency rates in conversation: Effects of age, relationship, topic, role, and gender. Language and Speech, 44(2), 123–147. doi:10.1177/00238309010440020101
Brocklehurst, P., (2013). Stuttering prevalence, incidence and recovery rates depend on how we define it: Comment on Yairi & Ambrose’ article epidemiology of stuttering: 21st century advances. Journal of Fluency Disorders, 38, 290–293. doi:10.1016/j.jfludis.2013.01.002
Byrd, C., Bedore, L., & Ramos, D., (2013). The disfluent speech of bilingual Spanish-English children: Considerations for differential diagnosis of stuttering. Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools, 46, 30–43. doi:10.1044/2014_LSHSS-14-0010
Carlo, E., & Watson, J., (2003). Disfluencies of 3- and 5-year old Spanish-speaking children. Journal of Fluency Disorders, 28, 37–53. doi:10.1016/S0094-730X(03)00004-4
Chevrie-Muller, C., & Plaza, C., (2001). Nouvelles épreuves pour l’examen du langage. Paris, France: Editions du Centre de Psychologie Appliquée.
Chon, H., Sawyer, J., & Ambrose, N. G., (2012). Differences of articulation rate and utterance length in fluent and disfluent utterances of preschool children who stutter. Journal of Communication Disorders, 45(6), 455–467. doi:10.1016/j.jcomdis.2012.08.003
Conture, E., (2001). Stuttering, its nature, diagnosis, and treatment. Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon.
Coquet, F., Ferrand, P., & Roustit, J., (2009). Batterie EVALO 2-6. Isbergues, France: Ortho Edition.
Crible, L., Degand, L., & Gilquin, G., (2017). The clustering of discourse markers and filled pauses. Languages in Contrast, 17(1), 69–95. doi:10.1075/lic.17.1.04cri
Eklund, R., & Shriberg, E., (1998). Crosslinguistic disfluency modeling: A comparative analysis of Swedish and American English human–human and human–machine dialogs. Fifth International Conference on Spoken Language Processing, 6(March 2016), 1–4.
Guitar, B., (2013). Stuttering: An integrated approach to its nature and treatment (4th ed.). Baltimore, MD: Lippincott-Williams & Wilkins.
Hedenqvist, C., Persson, F., & Eklund, R., (2015, August). Disfluency incidence in 6-year old Swedish boys and girls with typical language development. Paper presented at the 7th Workshop on Disfluency in Spontaneous Speech, Edinburgh, Scotland.
Howell, P., (2013). Screening school-aged children for risk of stuttering. Journal of Fluency Disorders, 38, 102–123. doi:10.1016/j.jfludis.2012.09.002
Johnson, W., (1961). Measurements of oral reading and speaking rate and disfluency of adult male and female stutterers and nonstutterers. Journal of Speech and Hearing Disorders, Monograph Supplement, No. 7, 1–20.
Khomsi, A., (2001). Evaluation du langage oral (ELO) [Oral language assessment]. Paris, France: ECPA.
Natke, U., Sandrieser, P., Pietrowsky, R., & Kalveram, K., (2006). Disfluency data of German preschool children who stutter and comparison children. Journal of Fluency Disorders, 31, 165–176. doi:10.1016/j.jfludis.2006.04.002
Oliveira, C. M., Broglio, G. A., Bernardes, A. P., & Capellini, S. A., (2013). Relationship between speech rate and speech disruption in cluttering. Codas, 25(1), 59–63. Retrieved from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24408172
Pellegrino, F., Coupé, C., & Marsico, E., (2011). A cross-language perspective on speech information rate. Language, 87(3), 539–558. doi:10.1353/lan.2011.0057
Pellowski, M., & Conture, E., (2002). Characteristics of speech disfluency and stuttering behaviors in 3- and 4-year-old children. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 45, 20–34. doi:10.1044/1092-4388(2002/002)
Riley, G. D., (2009). SSI-4: Stuttering severity instrument (4th ed.). Austin, TX: Pro-Ed.
Sawyer, J., Chon, H., & Ambrose, N. G., (2008). Influences of rate, length, and complexity on speech disfluency in a single speech sample in preschool children who stutter. Journal of Fluency Disorders, 33, 220–240. doi:10.1016/j.jfludis.2008.06.003
Sawyer, J., & Yairi, E., (2006). The effect of sample size on the assessment of stuttering severity. American Journal of Speech-Language Pathology, 15(1), 36–44. doi:10.1044/1058-0360(2006/005)
Tumanova, V., Conture, E., Lambert, E., & Walden, T., (2014). Speech disfluencies of preschool-age children who do and do not stutter. Journal of Communication Disorders, 49, 25–41. doi:10.1016/j.jcomdis.2014.01.003
Tumanova, V., Zebrowski, P. M., Throneburg, R. N., & Kulak Kayikci, M. E., (2011). Articulation rate and its relationship to disfluency type, duration, and temperament in preschool children who stutter. Journal of Communication Disorders, 44(1), 116–129. doi:10.1016/j.jcomdis.2010.09.001
Vihman, M., (1993). Variable paths to early word production. Journal of Phonetics, 21, 61–82.
Wingate, M., (2001). SLD is not stuttering. Journal of Speech, Language and Hearing Research, 44, 381–383. doi:10.1044/1092-4388(2001/031)
Yairi, E., (1982). Longitudinal studies of disfluencies in two-year-old children. Journal of Speech Language and Hearing Research, 25, 155–160. doi:10.1044/jshr.2501.155
Yairi, E., & Ambrose, N., (2013). Epidemiology of stuttering: 21st century advances. Journal of Fluency Disorders, 38, 66–87. doi:10.1016/j.jfludis.2012.11.002
Yairi, E., Watkins, R., Ambrose, N., & Paden, E., (2001). What is stuttering? Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 44, 585–597. doi:10.1044/1092-4388(2001/046)
Yaruss, J. S., (1997a). Clinical implications of situational variability in preschool children who stutter. Journal of Fluency Disorders, 22(3), 187–203. doi:10.1016/S0094-730X(97)00009-0
Yaruss, J. S., (1997b). Clinical measurement of stuttering behaviors. Contemporary Issues in Communication Science and Disorders, 24, 33–44.
Yaruss, J. S., Newman, R. M., & Flora, T., (1999). Language and disfluency in nonstuttering children’s conversational speech. Journal of Fluency Disorders, 24, 185–207. doi:10.1016/S0094-730X(99)00009-1