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From:
Date: 17 Apr 2010
Time: 08:06:51 -0500
Remote Name: 68.195.168.7
I wanted to add to what Klaas is saying. Yes, there is emerging evidence that (some but) not all PWC necessarily talk fast compared to typical speakers. However, several variables need to be considered. Firstly, the nature of the speaking task can be a great determinant. It has been my experience that the more informal and "unguarded" the speaking task (as when the individual is chatting with friends) the more likely the cluttering behaviors come forth. Secondly, we need to consider the "reasons" that cluttering is perceived to be fast. Namely, cluttered messages are often plagued by missing (sounds, syllables), misplaced, or even unnecessary verbiage (the linguistic maze behaviors) that makes the listener's task burdensome. Cluttered speech lack efficiency, clarity, and coherence in conveying information. Perhaps one reason it is often assumed to be "fast" is that the listener cannot keep up or decipher with the compromised message or that the loci of pauses do not match linguistic junctures. Thirdly, some PWC can normalize for brief periods when they choose to. I have a tape of one of the persons featured on the Stuttering Foundation dvd on cluttering whose overall phone message is barely intelligible; however, the phone number he iterated WAS quite intelligible because he slowed down. This leads one to ponder on the merit of a demands-capacity framework to try to explain cluttering. For many PWC, as they monitor and slow down (presumably closer to their theoretical maximum capacity for encoding the motoric and linguistic units of the message), their message is much improved.