AN EPIDEMIOLOGIC-STUDY OF STUTTERING

A questionnaire designed to assess the prevalence of stuttering and its relation with: (a) central nervous system risk factors; (b) associated disorders (allergies, migraine-type headache, developmental dyslexia history, smoking, and drug abuse), and (c) depression symptoms, was given to a general population sample of 1879 Spanish-speaking university students (mean age = 24.0). A prevalence of 2% of self-reported stuttering was found. Results indicated that the prevalence of minor brain injury or dysfunction, developmental dyslexia history, word-finding difficulties, and depressive symptoms was higher among the self-reported stutters than among the nonstutterers.