Dialogue without barriers. A comprehensive approach to dealing with stuttering

The book Dialogue without barriers: A comprehensive approach to dealing with stuttering is the result of Norwegian-Polish cooperation undertaken in the project LOGOLab – Dialogue without barriers. Three partners have been involved in the production of this book, namely, the University of Silesia in Katowice, Poland, the UiT Arctic University of Norway in Tromsø, and the Agere Aude Foundation for Knowledge and Social Dialogue. The project was implemented under the Education Program financed by the EEA Grants (EEA / 19 / K1 / D1 / W / 0031). The EEA Grants represent the contribution of Iceland, Liechtenstein, and Norway towards a green, competitive, and inclusive Europe. The most important goal of the LOGOLab project was to raise the standards of speech-language therapy in stuttering by incorporating the principles of Evidence-based practice, taking into account the assumptions of inclusive education and community-based model of intervention. An essential strategy for achieving this goal has become the dissemination of reliable and up-to-date knowledge about stuttering, and the development of appropriate social attitudes towards stuttering. The improvement of the quality of academic education for speech-language therapy students and of vocational training for certified speech-language therapists should also be mentioned. An additional aim was to provide reliable information for leaders of the self-help movement, who support people with stuttering non-institutionally

Changing Polish university students’ attitudes toward cluttering

Purpose This quasi-experimental design study in Poland explored the extent to which attitudes toward cluttering of university students could be changed or improved after a series of activities dedicated to attaining deeper recognition of problems associated with fluency disorders. Method University students were assigned to either an Experimental or a Control group, with 39 in each (total = 78). They all completed the Polish version of the Public Opinion Survey of Human Attributes–Cluttering (POSHA–Cl) on two occasions up to eight weeks apart. Participants in the Experimental group attended the following intervention activities: watching and discussing an educational video on cluttering, participating in a workshop on the nature of cluttering, and watching and discussing a documentary on the life experiences of people struggling with fluency disorders. The Experimental group also filled out an open-ended questionnaire at the end of the study. Results Pre-intervention comparisons indicated that participants assigned to either of the Experimental or Control groups differed significantly on 2 of the 15 summary ratings (13 %) of their pre-POSHA–Cl attitudes toward cluttering. For the Experimental group, the intervention resulted in significant positive changes in cluttering attitudes on 8 of the 15 summary ratings (53 %). In contrast, pre- and post- POSHA–Cl scores for the Control group were essentially unchanged (0 of 15 ratings). Conclusions This quasi-experimental study demonstrated that it is possible to positively modify the cluttering attitudes of university students. This has implications for the length, content, and experiential components of interventions designed to improve public attitudes toward fluency disorders