Written stuttering disclosure (Snyder et al., 2021)

Purpose: This study measured between-groups differences in perceived speech skills and personality characteristics of a 12-year-old male child who stutters (CWS) as a function of a written factual stuttering disclosure statement, delivered by the CWS, his “mother,” or his “teacher.”

Method: Four hundred twenty-four college-age adults were assigned to one of four groups, including three experimental groups (i.e., written self-disclosure, mother-written disclosure, and teacher-written disclosure) and a control group (no written disclosure). Participants in the control conditions viewed a brief video of the CWS. In the experimental conditions, participants read a brief written disclosure statement for 30 s, followed by the same video used in the control condition. After viewing the video, all participants completed surveys relative to their perceptions of the CWS speech skills and personality characteristics.

Results: Results reveal that a written stuttering disclosure statement provided by the mother correlated with select significant desirable perceptual differences of the CWS, while a written disclosure statement provided by the CWS yielded insignificant or even undesirable perceptual differences of the CWS. Written stuttering disclosures provided by a “teacher” did not yield any significant between-groups differences in the perception of a CWS. Gender affiliation was found to be a source of covariance in a number of perceived speech skills and personality characteristics.

Conclusions: Written stuttering disclosure statements provided by the “mother” correlated with select favorable perceptual differences of speech skills and personal characteristics of a CWS. Clinically, the application of novel methods (written and oral disclosure statements) and sources (i.e., CWS advocates such as “mother” and “teacher”) of stuttering disclosure statement can be integrated into a systematic therapeutic program, creating an innovative approach of scaffolding self-advocacy via stuttering disclosure in CWS.

Supplemental Material S1. The effects of written stuttering disclosure statements on speech intelligibility.

Supplemental Material S2. The effects of written stuttering disclosure statements on speech fluency.

Supplemental Material S3. The effects of written stuttering disclosure statements on speech rate.

Supplemental Material S4. The effects of written stuttering disclosure statements on speech volume.

Supplemental Material S5. The effects of written stuttering disclosure statements on degree of handicap.

Supplemental Material S6. Gender affiliation as a source of covariance in the perceptions of the reliable/unreliable continuum.

Supplemental Material S7. The effects of written stuttering disclosure statements on the unafraid/fearful continuum.

Supplemental Material S8. The effects of written stuttering disclosure statements on the intelligent/unintelligent continuum.

Supplemental Material S9. The effects of written stuttering disclosure statements on the confident/insecure continuum.

Supplemental Material S10. The effects of written stuttering disclosure statements on the friendly/unfriendly continuum.

Supplemental Material S11. The effects of written stuttering disclosure statements on outgoing/shy continuum.

Supplemental Material S12. The effects of written stuttering disclosure statements on the competent/incompetent continuum.

Supplemental Material S13. The effects of written stuttering disclosure statements on the approachable/unapproachable continuum.

Snyder, G., Manahan, A., McKnight, P., & Kornisch, M. (2021). The effects of written stuttering disclosure on the perceptions of a child who stutters. Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1044/2021_LSHSS-20-00119