Stuttering and Discourse Characteristics

The bulk of research in stuttering has focused on the mechanical aspects of stuttered speech, often ignoring the social factors that seem to comprise at least a cause and many of the consequences of stuttering. There has not been a study which relies completely on the sociolinguistic methodology of discourse analysis to look at a conversation produced by stuttering and non-stuttering speakers. The present study was conducted based on the belief that discourse analysis of such speech might reveal micro- and macro-level characteristics of interaction that may be the manifestations of the social selves possibly affected by the fact that one of the participants has lived through his life with stuttering, which is a stigma, according to Goffman (1963).

A 30 minute conversation between an adult male with stuttering (37), his wife (32) and the husband's brother (researcher, 35), was studied using discourse analysis. The conversation, which took the form of an unstructured interview, presented some interesting patterns. It seems that the members of the dyad were playing specific interactional/communicative roles, the wife playing the role of care-giver and the husband that of care-receiver. This may be due to the husband's stuttering. On a more micro analysis, a relationship between communicative pressure and stuttering frequency was revealed, consistent with the literature. Similarly, a relationship was observed between footing (Goffman, 1981) shifts and stuttering frequency.

Handicapping effects (Conture, 1996) of stuttering and the interlocutor's conversational accommodation (Hamilton, 1994) seemed to be present in their interaction. Such effects can be seen in daily social life and verbal production, and talk is precisely where these two dimensions intersect.For these reasons, discourse analysis looking at talk should make critical contributions to the long-lasting endeavors by stuttering researchers to unravel the mystery of stuttering.