Yasaman Jalilian1, Abbas Ebadi2*, Fariba Yadegari3, E. Charles Healey4, Ebrahim Hajizadeh5
Background: Stuttering is known as a multi-factorial fluency disorder. The CALMS assessment assesses stuttering from a multidimensional perspective, and the valid and reliable Persian version of CALMS (CALMS-P) is available. Due to the importance of stuttering treatment as a multi-factorial disorder, this study involved the use of the CALMS-P in order to assess the impact of variables such as age, gender, and family history on stuttering components in 115 Persian-speaking children who stutter. Methods: The study was performed from March 2015 to January 2016 in Tehran, Iran. In this cross-sectional and analytic study, the relation between the five components of CALMS-P and the age, gender, and family history of stuttering variables were examined. A p-value less than 0.05 was considered as statistically significant. A one-way ANOVA was performed on the stuttering factors at different ages to see if there was a relationship between the components and the age of people who stutter. In the second analysis, independent t-tests were performed on the stuttering factors for the different genders and family history of stuttering. Results: There was a difference between girls and boys in the linguistic and social components. The family history of stuttering had significant differences with affective, linguistic, and motor and social components of stuttering. Results also tentatively suggested that for people who stutter, increasing age may show higher cognitive information of stuttering. Conclusion: These findings have implications for treatment such as the necessity to address the cognitive aspects of stuttering at different ages and the need for additional clinical resources to be invested in stuttering treatment.
