Analisi delle dinamiche coarticolatorie per una diagnosi precoce di balbuzie cronica in età prescolare

Developmental stuttering is a disorder that manifests itself in the first childhood and persists in adulthood in 10% of cases. Early prediction of the eventual course of the disorder will allow clinicians to make informed decisions about selective treatment strategies, for example, reserving immediate clinical intervention to children showing high chances of chronicity. This approach could increase the chance to recover from stuttering symptoms. Some phonetic indexes have been identified as good prognostic markers of persistent stuttering, and anticipatory coarticulation is one of these. This paper will present preliminary results obtained from the acoustic analyses of the speech of 5 Italian stuttering children.