A pilot study of stuttering treatment for older children (STOC)

Purpose

This pilot study explored an operant treatment for school-age children, Stuttering Treatment for Older Children (STOC), in increasing quality of life and the fluency of school-aged children who stutter.

Method

The participants were seven children 9–13 years old. A single-case experimental design using multiple baselines was utilized, with participants randomly assigned to baselines of different lengths. STOC is a home-based treatment program that combined time-out with a specific performance-based criteria. Recordings of children’s speech were collected routinely as monthly samples (n = 653) and during treatment sessions (n = 1551). Clinicians immediately reviewed and provided feedback on recordings of sessions. Fidelity was measured in terms of dosage, adherence, quality of the delivery, and responsiveness.

Results

For all participants, the STOC intervention showed promising results. Participant-reported quality of life significantly increased for those participants who completed the STOC program. The frequency of stuttering (percentage of syllables stuttered) decreased by an average of 72 % between the initial baseline measurement and later stages. Additionally, the quantity of speech increased by 18 %, speech sounded more natural, with naturalness scores increased by 50 %, and the severity of stuttering decreased by 56 %. Only four participants finished the intervention. This suggests that the benefits of the intervention include both overall greater well-being and less disfluencies.

Conclusions

This pilot study showed increased speech fluency and quality of life among participants who completed the intervention. However, further investigation is crucial, and we encourage the academic community to engage in this research area.