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From: Dave Williams
Date: 20 Oct 2008
Time: 17:53:18 -0500
Remote Name: 71.228.93.115
Aileen, I think you misunderstood some things I said in the article. I would never say or imply that stuttering can be cured with a "dose" of therapy which "equals a few weeks." I believe strongly that stuttering therapy must deal with the client's emotions and attitudes as well as his specific stuttering behaviors, all of which may take considerable time. And I've never used the word "cure" or "cured" when talking about stuttering. You don't cure behavior--you change it. In the usual case, you're dealing with long and firmly established habit patterns and feelings, and to make permanent changes in those requires a lot of patient work and practice. I've seen any number of quick-fix therapy procedures come and go until you get the impression that they are constantly re-inventing the wheel. Back in the sixties, when operant methodology was so popular, the Skinnerians among therapists were quite certain that they could 'shape' behavior quickly and efficiently without bothering about messy things like emotions and beliefs, but today, for some reason, you don't hear much about operant procedures as the be-all and end-all of stuttering therapy, even though operant conditioning does have many uses in stuttering therapy.