Stuttering may be associated with increased anxiety in some children and adolescents

By PhD student Ria Bernard, UCL

 

At the end of January 2022, we published a new study in the Journal of Speech, Language and Hearing Research following an exciting collaboration between University College London (UCL) and the Western Norway University of Applied Sciences. The study systematically reviewed the literature and analysed findings from 11 studies that had compared anxiety and depression symptoms in children and adolescents (2-18 years) who do and do not stutter.

This project has been a little while in the making – starting when Dr Hilde Hofslundsengen joined UCL as a visiting researcher at the end of 2018! I was last invited to contribute to this blog after my stay with Hilde in Sogndal in May 2019, so I was delighted to be asked to share the study findings now our article has been published!

 

There were several take-home findings from this meta-analysis that we hope will inform clinical practice, future research and benefit young people who stutter.

 

Firstly, although there was substantial variation in reported anxiety symptoms across studies, overall, children and adolescents who stutter report higher anxiety symptoms than peers. At first glance this may not seem that surprising given the elevated risk for anxiety and social anxiety disorder reported in adults who stutter. But the high variability across studies is noteworthy.

 

Secondly, the high variability in outcomes mean that not all young people who stutter experience anxiety. We suggest that elevated anxiety may reflect other risk factors such as exposure to bullying, access to therapy, or family history of anxiety and depression, which may increase risk or resilience in children and adolescents who stutter. Unfortunately, few studies reported these additional variables, so it is currently unclear what factors contribute to this increased risk.

 

Thirdly, there were too few studies investigating depression to reliably comment on risk in young people who stutter. This highlights the need for more research, especially given the co-occurrence of anxiety and depression in the general population.

 

However, our findings do indicate the need to carefully monitor the mental health and well-being of children and adolescents who stutter. Ideally, in future, longitudinal studies that follow large groups of children who stutter over time would help us understand the association between stuttering and anxiety over the course of development.

 

If you would like to read more about this study, you can access it here: https://pubs.asha.org/doi/10.1044/2021_JSLHR-21-00236

 

It’s been an amazing experience collaborating with Hilde and Professor Norbury on this study, and I look forward to working together again soon!

 

We would like to thank our funders the Economic & Social Research Council (ESRC), Action for Stammering Children Charity and the Research Council of Norway for supporting this work.