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From: Peter Ramig
Date: 07 Oct 2005
Time: 10:27:26 -0500
Remote Name: 128.138.174.99
You are bringing up a point that applies to most people who stutter. That is, why are we more naturally fluent in some situations and more dysfluent in others? This is a very frustrating fact of stuttering that pertains to many who stutter. I feel it is safe to say that many researchers of stuttering feel the cause of this disorder is related to a neurologically based predisposition to stutter that a child is probably born with. That said, there is little doubt that the by-product of experiencing something that makes us feel different brings into the picture the emotional and psychological aspects that can signifcantly fuel the problem. More specifically, when one experiences frequent feelings of embarrassment, frustration, and even shame, as a result of stuttering, the body responds by tensing. This is more likely to happen when we anticipate the possibility of stuttering on sounds and words that have been problematic to us in prevously speaking situations, as well as certain situations and persons that been associated with difficulty previously. When stuttering is anticipated, the fear responses to looking different, feeling emabarrassed and shamed, kick in, tensing our already highly complex speech motor system and possibly interfering with our cognitive system. These reactions created by our feelings of inadequacy can certainly fuel exisiting stuttering. In contrast, when we have been more suceessful previously in certain situations, with certain sounds, words, people, we then enter into that experience with less apprehension and more of a positive expectation that we can do it as opposed to thinking or knowing that we can't. This difference in expectation, as a result of experience, is less likely to create the powerful and debilitating fear response. This scenario can certainly impact how much stuttering we experience in one situation versus another. Keep in mind that my aforementioned simple explanation is my perception that comes from MY experience as a stutterer and a clincian who works with persons who stutter. For the sake of this forum, my explanation is also meant to be a simple exposition to an incredibly complex problem and less-than-understood disorder.