Every year on October 22, International Stuttering Awareness Day is observed. International Stuttering Awareness Day serves to raise public awareness about the speech disorder that affects 1% of the global population. In honor of this day, we’ve gathered answers to the most asked questions about stuttering.
What is Stuttering?
According to the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders (https://www.nidcd.nih.gov), “stuttering is a speech disorder characterized by repetition of sounds, syllables, or words; prolongation of sounds; and interruptions in speech known as blocks.” Some people who stutter also present “struggle behaviors” while stuttering. These struggle behaviors can appear as rapid eye blinks, lip tremors, grimacing, or changes in loudness or pitch.
What Causes Stuttering?
Stuttering is broken into two categories – developmental stuttering and neurogenic stuttering. Developmental stuttering, the most common type of stutter, occurs in children when they’re learning speech and language skills. It’s believed developmental stuttering may be partially caused by genetics.
Neurogenic stuttering occurs after a brain injury – such as after a stroke or head trauma. After a brain injury, the brain may have trouble coordinating different regions required for typical speech pattern.
Researchers are still working on understanding stuttering in its entirety.
Who Stutters?
Stuttering most often occurs in children aged 2-6. Somewhere between 5% and 10% of all children will stutter for some period of time. Research has shown children born biologically male are 2 to 3 times more likely to stutter. As children grow into teens, this gap increases; those born biologically male are 3 to 4 times more likely to continue stuttering into adulthood. Approximately 75% of children stop stuttering within 1 or 2 years of developing a stutter.
How is Stuttering Treated?
While there is no cure for stuttering, a variety of treatments are available, depending on one’s age and communication goals.
For young children, treatment can be as simple as providing a relaxed home environment where a child is encouraged to speak and listened to while speaking. In these scenarios, listening to what a child is saying is more important than correcting them. By allowing children to practice talking, their confidence grows, and they’ll often “unlearn” stuttering.
For teens and adults, stuttering therapy is available. This type of therapy involves teaching methods to minimize a stutter and helping someone address any anxiety stuttering causes.
Self-help groups are responsible for many people’s success in overcoming anxieties around stuttering, which can help the stuttering patterns themselves. By gaining confidence in speaking, many stutters can become less noticeable.
How is International Stuttering Awareness Day Observed?
Every year the International Stuttering Association hosts on online conference, focusing on a unique theme.
If you don’t know much about stuttering, use this day to educate yourself! The Stuttering Foundation and the National Stuttering Association offer excellent online resources to help you understand stuttering.
Learn about someone famous who stutters. You may be shocked to find out some of your favorite sports stars, actors, and singers have struggled with a stutter.
Listen to those who stutter. When speaking to someone with a stutter, avoid finishing their sentences for them, maintain eye contact, and be patient.
Clinicians are researching new ways to understand stuttering every day in hopes of understanding more about the speech disorder. To keep up on the latest research and learn more, check out any of the linked organizations above.
