Approximately 70-80 million people stutter globally, which is around 1% of the population. This is about 3 million Americans.
For children, 5% are expected to experience stuttering that lasts over six months, and around 75% of them resolve their stuttering by their teen years. Stuttering affects boys 3 to 4 times as often as girls.
Stuttering is defined as a speech disorder which involves repeating sounds, syllables, or words; prolongation of sounds; and interruptions in speech (known as blocks). Speech disruptions can be accompanied by struggle behaviors, such as blinking the eyes rapidly or the lips trembling.
Stuttering can be caused by genetics (60% of children who stutter have a family member who stutters); family dynamics (such as fast-paced lifestyles and high expectations); child development (such as other speech or language problems, or other developmental delays); and neurophysiology (people who stutter process languages differently).
Stuttering can affect your child’s academic performance, quality of life, and relationships. Eventually, it can affect job opportunities as well. So addressing it as early as possible can provide your child the best support. The good news is, stuttering—especially when addressed early—is often highly treatable. And some treatments can find success even when the child is a teenager, or even as an adult.
If you think your child is beginning to stutter, seeking help as soon as possible is best.
First, ascertain ordinary stages of language development. For very young children, it can be a typical part of learning language to repeat words or phrases. If this is the case, the child will usually be relaxed and calm.
Stuttering can look similar, but often repeats individual sounds or syllables or getting stuck on a word and not making any sound. The child, however, will often seem tense, frustrated, or even start avoiding specific situations or words.
It may be wise to seek a professional opinion if:
- Your child is developing new language difficulties after 3.5 years old
- There is a family history of stuttering
- They experience frustration or tension while speaking, or are showing secondary behaviors around speech like trembling lips, blinking eyes, head nodding
- And the stuttering has lasted over 3-6 months.
Resources
If you’ve decided you want to explore resources further for your family, here are a few local options.
The Stuttering Foundation
The Ann Arbor District Library (AADL) has several of their resources available for community members.
The Stuttering Foundation also provides free and accessible online resources, services, and support to people who stutter and to their families. It also supports ongoing research into stuttering.
Check out their compilation of research, free brochures.free e-books and online videos to learn more.
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Reading
Read children’s books about stuttering to your child to help create normalization and support around the topic. The AADL has multiple titles available across the branches, including:
- I Talk Like a River, a lyrical story about a child stuttering at school, and receiving support from his dad
- When Oliver Speaks!, about a talented boy who is worried to give a class presentation, but his mother supports him in engaging with the assignment
- And The Boy Who Found His Voice, about a school boy nervous of show-and-tell, who discovers he can express himself beautifully through art.
Michigan Medicine’s Speech Neurophysiology Lab
This lab hosts a monthly stuttering support group with the Ann Arbor Stuttering Awareness and Research Club for teens and adults. The focus is to provide a safe space to connect with other people who stutter, creating solidarity and navigating challenges.
The support group is available in person and via zoom (click here for link). In-person is at the downtown AADL branch on the fourth Wednesday of each month, from 6-7:30pm.
The Ann Arbor Stuttering Awareness and Research Club
This club is comprised of students who care deeply about pediatric neurodevelopment and partnerships between the community and academia. They provide education and awareness of stuttering through a variety of support groups, outreach events, and partnerships..
See a specialist
There are multiple pediatric speech-language clinics in the area who can support your child and family. Some include:
- A2 Therapy Works, LLC. A private practice with locations in both Ann Arbor and Plymouth-Canton. They provide speech and occupational therapy, literacy intervention, myofunctional therapy, and feeding therapy–and also offer online resources.
- University of Michigan Health Speech-Language Pathology. Near Mott’s, these clinical specialists are well equipped to address complex speech-language disorders
