There is a good discussion going on the excellent http://closetstutterer.blogspot.com/ about the causes of stammering.
My contribution to the comments is the request for an update on Sophie's progress. The posts then get a bit out of sync.
Rather than joining that discussion I thought to let you know of it and add my own view here.
When I was 6yrs old I copied a boy in my class who stammered. My mother told me to speak properly and that was the end of that. The point is I copied one of my peer group. The lad was popular in the class and we were friends. I copied his way of speaking and we all do that.
I live in a town where there are a lot of parents with English accents and their children have Scottish accents. Who have the children modelled? When I was small I went on holiday to Ireland every year for 4-5 weeks and came back with an Irish accent.
Children unconsciously copy other people. It is worthwhile being clear about the difference between learning, copying or modelling, and teaching. Children copy others: parents, peer group - this is often passive learning. They are also taught actively and both mechanisms result in learning.
As a teenager I deliberately copied a stammering TV character for a few months till the benefit of not stammering was made clear to me. We emulate TV personalities in terms of other behaviours, language and dress: so why not how they speak - stammering?
I am not convinced that stammering that 'runs in families' cannot be explained by children copying adults. Copying others is what children and adults do.
Just watch people at a cafe and look how one mirrors the others' behaviour. This isn't deliberate. It is part of the cybernetics of rapport . Drop an unusual but sensible word into a conversation at a meeting and notice how long it takes someone to take it up and how often it is repeated. Rapport again. Subconscious. Why should stammering be different?
This is not to say that stammering is always a result of copying or modelling others' behaviour. I think stammering emerges as a behaviour and will have multiple ingredients that will be specific to the PWS. But copying can be one of the ingredients.
From the previous posts you will realise that I don't believe in cause-effect: so I would speculate that habit, self perception, shame and guilt, self consciousness and feelings of victimisation will eventually be added to the mix. All of this directs the PWSs attention back onto herself - just the state of affairs that perpetuates the problem ie the attempt at the solution becomes the problem - see previous posts.
And a Happy Christmas to all my Readers!
Sunday, December 23, 2007
Friday, December 14, 2007
What stops me
If speech has to be effortless, what is the prior effort about and how are you making the effort?
Reading the articles on stammering sites it is clear that attention is focussed on fear of stammering. So investigating these fears is a good way of starting, and writing the findings down is the only way of separating the ingredients if you are working by yourself.
Having identified them are the fears reasonable or are they fears that have no real substance? Do other people actually care about your stammer as much as you think? What is your evidence?
However, concerns about stammering don't actually deal with the original situation from which the stammer emerged and how the ingredients are being brought together ie The 'why me?' question. What was going on in your life when you started stammering. If you were at school or before hand could you have copied someone elses stammer? What were the school or family circumstances going on when you began stammering?
Other suggested questions:
What am I thinking when I stammer?
What is the effort attempting to solve?
Am I making the effort as a child would or as an adult?
Am I seeing the world, in terms of speaking, as a child or adult?
Pick a single episode where you stammered and investigate that, otherwise it is too easy to theorise or rely on myth to explain your thinking. The theory and the myth will have major errors. It is your actual thinking that is important and if you can't be clear about that then try to guess but be clear that you are guessing and treat the result tentatively.
The judgment should follow the description and don't be in too much of a hurry to converge on the answers.
If you don't write the answers out you will be doing yourself a disservice.
Reading the articles on stammering sites it is clear that attention is focussed on fear of stammering. So investigating these fears is a good way of starting, and writing the findings down is the only way of separating the ingredients if you are working by yourself.
Having identified them are the fears reasonable or are they fears that have no real substance? Do other people actually care about your stammer as much as you think? What is your evidence?
However, concerns about stammering don't actually deal with the original situation from which the stammer emerged and how the ingredients are being brought together ie The 'why me?' question. What was going on in your life when you started stammering. If you were at school or before hand could you have copied someone elses stammer? What were the school or family circumstances going on when you began stammering?
Other suggested questions:
What am I thinking when I stammer?
What is the effort attempting to solve?
Am I making the effort as a child would or as an adult?
Am I seeing the world, in terms of speaking, as a child or adult?
Pick a single episode where you stammered and investigate that, otherwise it is too easy to theorise or rely on myth to explain your thinking. The theory and the myth will have major errors. It is your actual thinking that is important and if you can't be clear about that then try to guess but be clear that you are guessing and treat the result tentatively.
The judgment should follow the description and don't be in too much of a hurry to converge on the answers.
If you don't write the answers out you will be doing yourself a disservice.
Tuesday, December 4, 2007
Effortless speech
What did I learn from my visit to the Glasgow group?
That stammering is unbelievably effortful and that speaking is effortless.
Why?
Because the PWS is doing a great many things in their head, and when pushed and given no time to think the internal dialogue has to stop and so, like the rest of us, the PWS speaks effortlessly to get his point across.
I have also noticed this before with PWS. When not given the luxury of time to plan and second guess and go internal: speaking becomes effortless. When the attention is directed beyond, to the topic or the other person or group, speech becomes effortless.
I think we should stop talking about fluency or ‘normal’ speech and instead look to EFFORTLESSLY SPEAK. You have to work to be fluent but you can speak effortlessly - toddlers do and so did most PWS did before they didn't.
As with blushing: we can’t effortfully not blush, it has to be effortless and when we don’t make an effort we don’t blush!!
That stammering is unbelievably effortful and that speaking is effortless.
Why?
Because the PWS is doing a great many things in their head, and when pushed and given no time to think the internal dialogue has to stop and so, like the rest of us, the PWS speaks effortlessly to get his point across.
I have also noticed this before with PWS. When not given the luxury of time to plan and second guess and go internal: speaking becomes effortless. When the attention is directed beyond, to the topic or the other person or group, speech becomes effortless.
I think we should stop talking about fluency or ‘normal’ speech and instead look to EFFORTLESSLY SPEAK. You have to work to be fluent but you can speak effortlessly - toddlers do and so did most PWS did before they didn't.
As with blushing: we can’t effortfully not blush, it has to be effortless and when we don’t make an effort we don’t blush!!
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