Latency of vocalization onset for stutterers and nonstutterers under conditions of auditory and visual cueing

The purpose of this study was to determine whether stutters and nonstutterers differed in latency of vocalization onset as a function of auditory and visual stimulus presentations. Twelve adult stutterers and 12 adult nonstutterers were compared for phonation onset latency under conditions of visual, right ear auditory, and left ear auditory cueing. Analysis of the data indicated that (a) overall phonation onset time did not differ significantly between the groups, (b) no significant differences were found for phonation onset time under conditions of combined auditory cueing, (c) stutterers were significantly slower for /pae/when auditory cueing was presented to either the left or right ear, (d) stutters were significantly slower for /pae/ and /bae/ when the values were combined for the left ear, and (e) there were not significant differences between stutterers' and non nonstutterers' phonation onset times under visual cueing. The results are interpreted to implicate a possible role of auditory system functioning in stutterers' motor control for speech tasks such as phonation onset.