[ Contents | Search | Next | Previous | Up ]
From: Scott Palasik PhD, CCC-SLP
Date: 12 Oct 2011
Time: 21:34:27 -0500
Remote Name: 68.63.222.213
Damon! Nice to meet you (so to speak) and thanks for question. Being a person who CAN stutter I use both terms. Charlie brings up a great point about the words “is” and “am”. These simple words can “fuse” people to a thought and build constructs that are not entirely accurate. For example if you say. “I am a sad person” is that accurate? Probably not, you might be sad sometimes, you might be happy sometimes, you might be neutral sometimes. The point is language is a power tool to constructing perceptions of ourselves and others and when we use “Prison words” (Kelly Wilson’s term, a contextual psychologist at Ole Miss) like “always, never, am”, these words allow not options or flexibility in thought and can perpetuate a construct of ourselves that is not true, all the time. We can teach this concept by inserting a simple word like “can”, which allows flexibility in behaviors (both thoughts and physical actions). That all being said, we give meaning to words and language of which we choose. The word “Stutterer” doesn’t have to be negative, if choose it not to be negative. These are just my thoughts and some perceptions from contextual behavior psychology. Thanks for asking the question Damon and feel free to keep asking questions!