Abstract

ANDRADE, Claudia Regina Furquim de; SASSI, Fernanda Chiarion; JUSTE, Fabiola  and  MENDONCA, Lucia Iracema Zanotto de. Persistent developmental stuttering as a cortical-subcortical dysfunction: evidence from muscle activation. Arq. Neuro-Psiquiatr. [online]. 2008, vol.66, n.3b, pp. 659-664. ISSN 0004-282X.  http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/S0004-282X2008000500010.

BACKGROUND: One contemporary view of stuttering posits that speech disfluencies arise from anomalous speech motor control. PURPOSE: To verify the rest muscle tension and speech reaction time of fluent and stuttering adults. METHOD: 22 adults, divided in two groups: G1 - 11 fluent individuals; G2 - 11 stutterers. Electromyography recordings (inferior orbicularis oris) were collected in two different situations: during rest and in a reaction time activity. RESULTS: The groups were significantly different considering rest muscle tension (G2 higher recordings) and did not differ when considering speech reaction time and muscle activity during speech. There was a strong positive correlation between speech reaction time and speech muscle activity for G2 - the longer the speech reaction time, the higher the muscle activity during speech. CONCLUSION: In addition to perceptible episodes of speech disfluency, stutterers exhibit anomalies in speech motor output during fluent speech. Correlations with a possible cortical-subcortical disorder are discussed.

Keywords : speech; stuttering; electromyography; reaction time.