Auditory feedback control in adults who stutter during metronome-paced speech I. Timing Perturbation

• Published in: Journal of fluency disorders 2023-03, Vol.75, p.105943-105943, Article 105943
• Main Authors: Frankford, Saul A., Cai, Shanqing, Nieto-Castañón, Alfonso, Guenther, Frank H.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Adult; Auditory feedback; Cues; Feedback; Humans; Language; Metronome; Speech - physiology; Speech timing control; Stuttering
• ISSN: 0094-730X; 1873-801X
• DOI: 10.1016/j.jfludis.2022.105943

This study determined whether adults who stutter (AWS) exhibit deficits in responding to an auditory feedback timing perturbation, and whether external timing cues, which increase fluency, attenuate any disruptions due to altered temporal auditory feedback. Fifteen AWS and sixteen adults who do not stutter (ANS) read aloud a multisyllabic sentence either with normal pacing or with each syllable paced at the rate of a metronome. On random trials, an auditory feedback timing perturbation was applied, and timing responses were compared between groups and pacing conditions. Both groups responded to the timing perturbation by delaying subsequent syllable boundaries, and there were no significant differences between groups in either pacing condition. Furthermore, no response differences were found between normally paced and metronome-paced conditions. These findings are interpreted as showing that 1) AWS respond normally to pure timing perturbations, and 2) metronome-paced speech has no effect on online speech timing control as assessed in the present experiment. •Adults who stutter show typical responses to explicit speech timing perturbations.•Metronome-timed speech does not alter responses to timing perturbations.•Auditory feedback is used to control speech timing during naturalistic utterances.