Assessment of stuttering like disfluency and construction of clinical model considering speech/language acquisition

2023 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 17K04941
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Section: 一般
• Research Field: Special needs education
• Research Institution: Fukuoka University of Education
• Principal Investigator: Kenjo Masamutsu 福岡教育大学, 教育学部, 教授 (30279591)
• Co-Investigator(Kenkyū-buntansha): 氏平 明 兵庫大学, 留学・国際交流センター, 教授 (10334012)
• Project Period (FY): 2017-04-01 – 2024-03-31
• Keywords: 吃音 / 幼児 / 発話 / 非流暢性 / 言語獲得 / 調音（構音） / 音韻論 / 有標

Outline of Final Research Achievements

In this study, we conducted a phonological analysis of Japanese speaking infants' natural and conversational speech samples, and examined whether infants' speech disfluencies are stuttering or non-stuttering, taking into account aspects of speech/language development. The purpose of this study was to obtain basic data for use in differential diagnosis.
The subjects were 40 infants (18 boys, 22 girls) between the ages of 4 and 6, and their speech disfluencies mainly included repetition and substitution. Speech disfluencies decreased with age, and no gender differences were observed.
Most repetiton units are moras, and there were also repetitions of marked segmental elements (/s/, /r/, /k/) that are acquired late and are difficult to manipulate the articulatory organs. Stuttering like disfluencies occurred in 0-2% of syllable-based utterances.

Free Research Field

特別支援教育学

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

言語獲得期にある幼児の発話の非流暢性が吃音であるか非吃音であるかの鑑別診断については十分調べられていなく、本研究では、日本語話者の幼児の自然な発話と会話の録音調査を実施し、幼児の発音と発話の言語学的側面を記述した。そして、言語発達の様相も踏まえ、幼児の発話の非流暢性が吃音であるか非吃音であるかの鑑別診断に生かすための基礎資料を得た。
発話の非流暢性には、繰り返しと置換がみられ、年齢が高くなるほど少なく、性差はみられなかった。繰り返しの単位の多くはモーラで、獲得時期が遅く、調音器官の操作が難しいとされる有標の分節素の繰り返しもみられ、吃的非流暢性は音節単位の発話中0～2％であった。