Compare Oro-Motor Speech (OMS) and Total Language Score (TLS) in Children with Stuttering (CWS) and Children with No Stuttering (CWNS)

Abstract

Stuttering is probably the best known speech disorder; it is a multifaceted disorder which has been the area of interest for the researchers since two decades or more. It is perhaps the most difficult to define or explain and to treat (Yairi and Ambrose, 2005). The disorder being a complex clinical population is present in around 1% of adults in the world and about 2.5 % in children (Proctor, Craig and Peters, 2002). It was also observed that the age of 3 to 5 years is the most critical period for the beginning of stuttering, because it is during this time that children accomplish the task of learning the transformations of adult language and their motor structures and function develops. The present study aims to compare the diadochokinetic rate in CWS and CWNS. Participants were children between age ranges 5 – 7 years. They were divided in two groups. Group I will consist of 20 CWS and Group II will have 50 CWNS. Objective was to find the difference between total language abilities and oro-motor speech abilities in CWS and CWNS. The results reveal that CWS were poorer in total language abilities than CWNS, though this difference was not statistically significant {F=2.15 (1), (P>0.05)}. There is a significant difference {F=7.708 (1), (P<0.01)} in oro-motor speech abilities in between CWNS and CWS, majorly with oro-motor speech task which includes repetition of word, phrases, sentence and diadochokinetic rate. This shows that CWS faces difficulty in speech coordination tasks. The results support the notion that speech motor tasks in CWS are a problem area, which is neglected by most of the speech therapists. Implications of the present study will help in planning better treatment for CWS. As the population considered for the present study was very limited, so the results cannot be generalised. Future researches can be done on larger population to see whether the difference in oro-motor speech tasks varies with gender, severity and age.