An Operant Intervention for Early Stuttering

Abstract

Stuttering is a common speech disorder that causes significant distress and may cause social maladjustment and hinder occupational potential. Treatments for chronic stuttering in adults can control stuttering by teaching the speaker to use a newspeech pattern. However, these treatments are resource intensive and relapse prone, and they produce speech that sounds unnatural to the listener and feels unnatural to the speaker. This article describes the development and evaluation of an operant treatment for early stuttering. Parents are trained to present verbal contingencies for stuttered and stutter-free speech during everyday speaking situations with their children. The authors overview outcome data from several studies that suggest that this program produces relapse-free control of stuttered speech in preschool children in the medium and long term in a cost-effective manner.