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NEUROLOGY 2005;65:1246-1252
© 2005 American Academy of Neurology

Abnormal speech sound representation in persistent developmental stuttering

Sílvia Corbera, MSc, María-José Corral, MSc, Carles Escera, PhD and Ma Angeles Idiazábal, MD

From the Cognitive Neuroscience Research Group, Department of Psychiatry and Clinical Psychobiology, University of Barcelona, Catalonia-Spain (Ms. Corbera, Ms. Corral, and Dr. Escera); and Psychiatry Service, Hospital del Mar, Barcelona, Catalonia-Spain (Dr. Idiazábal).

Address correspondence and reprint requests to Dr. Carles Escera: Cognitive Neuroscience Research Group, Department of Psychiatry and Clinical Psychobiology, Faculty of Psychology, University of Barcelona, P. Vall d’Hebron 171, 08035 Barcelona, Catalonia-Spain; e-mail: cescera{at}ub.edu

Objectives: To determine whether adults with persistent developmental stuttering (PDS) have auditory perceptual deficits.

Methods: The authors compared the mismatch negativity (MMN) event–related brain potential elicited to simple tone (frequency and duration) and phonetic contrasts in a sample of PDS subjects with that recorded in a sample of paired fluent control subjects.

Results: Subjects with developmental stuttering had normal MMN to simple tone contrasts but a significant supratemporal left-lateralized enhancement of this electrophysiologic response to phonetic contrasts. In addition, the enhanced MMN correlated positively with speech disfluency as self-rated by the subjects.

Conclusions: Individuals with persistent developmental stuttering have abnormal permanent traces for speech sounds, and their abnormal speech sound representation may underlie their speech disorder. The link between abnormal speech neural traces of the auditory cortex and speech disfluency supports the relevance of speech perception mechanisms to speech production.

Supported by grants from the Generalitat de Catalunya (XT2003-00084) and the Spanish Ministry of Science and Technology (BSO2003-002440).

Disclosure: The authors report no conflicts of interest.

Received February 24, 2005. Accepted in final form July 11, 2005.






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