Why stuttering starts

Speech difficulties that appear after an emotional trauma psychogenic stuttering are uncommon and not the same as developmental stuttering. Males are much more likely to stutter than females are. Factors that increase the risk of stuttering include:.

Mayo Clinic does not endorse companies or products. Advertising revenue supports our not-for-profit mission. This content does not have an English version. This content does not have an Arabic version. Overview Stuttering — also called stammering or childhood-onset fluency disorder — is a speech disorder that involves frequent and significant problems with normal fluency and flow of speech.

Request an Appointment at Mayo Clinic. Share on: Facebook Twitter. Show references Stuttering. American Speech-Language-Hearing Association. Accessed May 4, Childhood-onset fluency disorder stuttering. Arlington, Va. FAQ: Stuttering facts and information. Stuttering Foundation of America. Carter J, et al. Emotional factors are difficult to measure, and cannot be considered the primary cause of stuttering. However, negative emotions may place an additional cognitive burden on children who stutter during a critical period of language development.

Most people who stutter begin stuttering in childhood, during the developmental period in which they are learning to communicate. In more rare cases, stuttering is the result of brain injury or severe psychological trauma.

There are many Common Myths that include theories about what causes stuttering. Original material provided by: Leslee Dean, M. Medina, Ph. How stuttering develops: The multifactorial dynamic pathways theory. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research , 60 9 , Brain Activity in People Who Stutter While no one factor determines stuttering, the predominate theory suggests that a combination of genetics, language development, and the environment can influence the brain activity of people who stutter.

Genetic Factors Family histories of stuttering demonstrate that stuttering runs in families and is influenced by genetic factors. Emotions and the Environment As children become aware of their disfluencies, negative feelings related to speaking may increase tension and further affect their ability to communicate. For most, stuttering begins in childhood, while children are developing language skills — but in rare cases, it can come come on suddenly, mangling the speech of adults who'd never struggled with the problem before.

The cause of sudden onset stuttering is either neurogenic meaning the brain has trouble sending signals to nerves, muscles or areas of the brain that control speaking or psychogenic caused by emotional problems. A sudden stutter can be caused by a number of things: brain trauma, epilepsy, drug abuse particularly heroin , chronic depression or even attempted suicide using barbiturates, according to the National Institutes of Health.

In sudden cases sparked by underlying psychological issues, "often times, you can find that it's not so sudden; there might be a history of stuttering that had been outgrown," says Dr. Tommie L. According to one case report , a year-old woman hit her head in a car crash, and the trauma to her brain appeared to cause a temporary stutter.