Phonological priming in young children who stutter: holistic versus incremental processing.

PURPOSE To investigate the holistic versus incremental phonological encoding processes of young children who stutter (CWS; N = 26) and age- and gender-matched children who do not stutter (CWNS; N = 26) via a picture-naming auditory priming paradigm. METHOD Children named pictures during 3 auditory priming conditions: neutral, holistic, and incremental. Speech reaction time (SRT) was measured from the onset of picture presentation to the onset of participant response. RESULTS CWNS shifted from being significantly faster in the holistic priming condition to being significantly faster in the incremental priming condition from 3 to 5 years of age. In contrast, the majority of 3- and 5-year-old CWS continued to exhibit faster SRT in the holistic than the incremental condition. CONCLUSION CWS are delayed in making the developmental shift in phonological encoding from holistic to incremental processing, a delay that may contribute to their difficulties establishing fluent speech.