The Effects of Verbal Stimuli on Disfluencies During Spontaneous Speech

Abstract

A total of 104 normal college adults were divided among four speech conditions. In the 100% condition, subjects heard “wrong” after each disfluency (interjection or repetition). Subjects in the 25% condition were presented “wrong” after every fourth disfluency. Instruction condition subjects were simply urged to speak without disfluencies. In the Instr.+100% condition, the last two treatments were combined. Sessions were 50 minutes, divided into a baseline, two treatment, and two recovery segments. With the exception of the Instr.+100% group, low level subjects were unaffected by the procedures. Among the high level subjects, there were significant reductions in disfluencies between baseline and treatment segments for the 100%, Instr., and Instr.+100% groups. No effects were obtained for the 25% subjects. Recovery effects were not obtained for any group.