Swedish outcomes of the Overall Assessment of the Speaker’s Experience of Stuttering in an international perspective

Abstract

Aim: The purpose of the present project was to translate the Overall Assessment of the Speaker’s Experience of Stuttering (OASES) to Swedish, and to compare the results with available international data.

Method: The Swedish versions of OASES-A, OASES-T and OASES-S were administered to 80 adults, 27 teenagers and 32 children who stutter, respectively. The overall impact scores and the impact scores for each of the four sections of the instrument were analyzed in relation to other studies involving the OASES.

Results: The results revealed that all three Swedish versions of OASES had normally distributed outcomes and that they were reliable and valid. The overall impact scores for adults (2.33), teenagers (2.60) and children (2.28) all fell within Impact Rating Moderate. The mean overall impact score for OASES-A-S was significantly lower than corresponding data from USA, Australia and Japan (p < .01). There was no difference between Swedish and American teenagers, or between Swedish and American or Dutch schoolchildren.

Conclusion: There seems to be cultural differences in the experience of negative consequences associated with stuttering. This suggests that cultural aspects should be carefully considered in assessment, treatment, and research involving individuals who stutter.

Keywords:

• Stuttering
• associated symptoms
• cultural aspects
• Overall Assessment of the Speaker’s Experience of Stuttering (OASES)
• Swedish data

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Acknowledgements

We wish to express our gratitude to all the respondents who participated in the study and the SLP’s who were assisting in the recruitment of participants.

Disclosure statement

J. Scott Yaruss is co-author of The Overall Assessment of the Speaker’s Experience of Stuttering. The authors E. Lindström, E. Nilsson, J. Nilsson, I. Schödin, N Strömberg, S. Österberg and I. Samson report no declarations of interest.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Elisabeth Lindström

Elisabeth Lindström, SLP, PhD, is a retired speech language pathologist. She was director of the study programme in SLP and senior lecturer at Umeå University. From 2011 to 2017 she was a guest teacher and associate professor at Åbo Akademi University, Turku, Finland.

Emma Nilsson

Emma Nilsson, SLP, completed her Master degree (one year) in Speech and Language Pathology at Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden, in 2015. Currently, she works as a speech language pathologist at Mälarsjukhuset in Eskilstuna, Sweden.

Julie Nilsson

Julie Nilsson, SLP, completed her Master degree (one year) in Speech and Language Pathology at Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden, in 2014. She holds a position as speech language pathologist at a clinic in Gustavsberg, a community close to Stockholm.

Isabelle Schödin

Isabelle Schödin, SLP, completed her Master degree (one year) in Speech and Language Pathology at Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm in 2015. She is currently working as a speech language pathologist at Danderyd University Hospital, Stockholm.

Nina Strömberg

Nina Strömberg Wike is a practicing speech language pathologist. She completed her Master degree (one year) in Speech and Language Pathology at Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, in 2015.

Sofia Österberg

Sofia Österberg, SLP, graduated from Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm, Sweden (one year Master) in the summer of 2018 and started her career as a clinical speech language pathologist at Karolinska University Hospital in Huddinge, Stockholm, in late 2018.

J. Scott Yaruss

J. Scott Yaruss, PhD, is a Professor of Communicative Sciences and Disorders at Michigan State University. He is a licensed/certified speech-language pathologist (SLP), a board-certified specialist in fluency disorders, and an ASHA Fellow. Professor Yaruss is co-author of the Overall Assessment of the Speaker's Experience of Stuttering.

Ineke Samson

Ineke Samson, SLP, MSc, is a speech language pathologist at the Department of speech and language therapy in Danderyds hospital in Stockholm, Sweden. She is recognized as specialist in accordance with the Swedish Speech and Language Association criteria and as European Fluency Specialist (EFS) in accordance with criteria developed by the European Clinical Specialization in Fluency consortium. Ineke is a doctoral student at the Department of Clinical Science, Intervention and Technology, Division of Speech and Language Pathology, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm.