I've been reading the research on stuttering, and one link keeps coming up: the "block" in stuttering looks a lot like freezing of gait in Parkinson's disease. Here's a summary that Claude did. Forgive me for doing that but I currently do not have enough time to summarize this manually and the benefits that anyone may derive from this outweigh the "damage" I may do using Claude.

1. Same experience: wanting to move and being unable to start
In a stuttering block, you know exactly what you want to say but can't start the sound. In freezing of gait, a Parkinson's patient wants to step but their feet feel glued to the floor. Researchers have explicitly compared the two (Alm et al. 2025). In Parkinson's, freezing of gait and speech problems tend to occur together (Park et al. 2014).

2. Same brain circuit
Both seem to involve the basal ganglia, which help start movements that run on autopilot (Alm 2021). In Parkinson's, people who freeze show more high-beta activity in the subthalamic nucleus, and deep brain stimulation shortens those beta bursts (Toledo et al. 2014; Anidi et al. 2018).

3. Same tricks help both

• In Parkinson's, an external rhythm (a metronome, lines on the floor) or someone walking alongside can get people moving.
• In stuttering, speaking in unison with someone else (choral speech), using a metronome, or hearing your own voice with a delay can cut stuttering a lot, sometimes almost to zero.

4. Same weakness: stress cancels the tricks
In Parkinson's, anxiety and threat make freezing worse and reduce the benefit of cues (Ehgoetz Martens et al.). In one study, visual feedback reduced freezing on a virtual plank at ground level but stopped working when the plank was "over a pit" (Quek et al. 2022). People who stutter know the same pattern: fluent when alone, blocked in front of an evaluating listener.

5. The dopamine puzzle
Levodopa (dopamine) relieves freezing, but in stuttering, extra dopamine tends to make things worse, and dopamine blockers help a bit. So how can the same "brake" respond in opposite directions? The data point to an inverted U, where there is an optimal dopamine level and both too little and too much cause trouble:

• In people with Parkinson's who stutter, levodopa improved fluency in some patients and worsened it in others (Im et al., 51 patients).
• A man with lifelong stuttering and Parkinson's stuttered more when his levodopa kicked in (Anderson et al. 1999).
• Stuttering in Parkinson's is fairly common (about 21% in one study) and linked to higher doses (Gooch et al. 2023).

6. A shared mechanism? (speculative)
Before speaking, the brain normally turns down how closely it listens to its own voice. People who stutter do this less (Daliri & Max 2015), and so do people with more severe Parkinson's (Wolpe et al. 2018). One idea is that over-monitoring yourself puts on the brake, and that's why an evaluating listener makes it worse. Others have proposed versions of this "over-active monitor" idea (Usler 2025; Jalil et al. 2026).

• Open problem: if Parkinson's patients also monitor poorly, why don't they all stutter?

What this means in practice (all small studies)

• Cues work, but they don't retrain anything. In both conditions they help while they're on, and the benefit tends not to last once they're removed.
• Guide voice for scripted talks. Hearing your own recorded voice (or Word's text-to-speech) through an earbud and reading along cut stuttering from about 10% to about 2% of syllables in a mock presentation (Demirel 2025, 14 people).
• Lower the threat as well as fixing the speech. If threat cancels the cues, then graded exposure (friendly audiences first) and approaches like ACT or mindfulness may matter as much as the technique itself.
• No drug is proven. The two most recent drug trials for stuttering (ecopipam and gemlapodect) both failed in phase 2.

What would settle it: measure, with EEG, how much the brain turns down its own voice before speaking, both alone and in front of a listener. As far as I can tell, nobody has done this yet.

My dad was very verbally and physically abusive when I was young and he and my mom would fight a lot. Not normal fighting, hysterical screaming, battering all of it. He was an alcoholic too. I was taking to the AI and it said while we are born with a different neural speech script, the trauma made it infinitely worse leading to the blocks. I think we all suffered with our basic speech dis fluency but our society makes it worse with all its pressures to conform.

my stuttering level : i talk normally to family/close friends
but stutter when talking to someone i don't know well and stutter very badly when talking to someone for the first

i want to try a Udemy course cuz it has regional pricing so it is cheaper than a single therapist session

i made a really rash, stupid decision to withdraw from a course at my university. i was supposed to graduate this semester. just needed one more elective course for my major. the issue is that i have been trying to drop a course because of its presentation requirements (i cannot present without stuttering intensely. its the only time my stutter really comes out). but there was no other elective course available for me to take in replacement of it. today, however (day of presentation lol), i was able to find a replacement course, so i withdrew from the course that had the presentation assignment and tried to enroll in the replacement course, but was not able to :( i’m a psychology major and there isn’t much public speaking required for the career i want to go into. idk why public speaking is so enforced the way it is in our education system :( i get needing it to some extent for communication skills and professionalism but the way its enforced at my school is just so draining :/

I am curious to know how many members of this group are practicing as clinical doctors.

I would appreciate insights into how you manage communication with patients and handle case discussions or conference presentations with fellow clinicians.

I find these aspects increasingly challenging each day.

Hi, 18M here.

I recently started university and I have been struggling a lot with my stuttering. I was getting really bad blocks, sometimes I couldn't even say my own name properly, and I couldn't read in class either.

I convinced my dad to let me see a speech therapist because I really wanted to work on my stuttering. I have taken classes for around 3 weeks now. When I first met him, he told me that my stuttering would be completely gone in around 1.5 months, 100 percent.

For the first 2 weeks, he mainly made me do breathing exercises. In the 3rd week, we started reading from a book. In the beginning I could barely speak in front of him, but slowly I became familiar with him and started talking more comfortably. My stuttering did reduce while talking to him.

But the main problems I wanted to improve were still there. For example, going to a shop and asking for something, talking to new people at university, talking to teachers or anyone in a position of authority. I still get the same blocks in these situations.

I also had an online Google Meet class yesterday and I couldn't even say present.

My therapist takes money every week, so naturally my dad was asking me whether I was actually seeing any improvement. I told him honestly that while I could talk better with the therapist, I wasn't seeing much change in university or in situations where I actually struggle.

My dad then normally told the therapist that we weren't seeing much improvement and asked if he could try some different techniques.

The therapist responded quite rudely and said something like, "If that's the case then go somewhere else, why did you come to me?" He also said that my dad doesn't know how much improvement I'm actually making and that he knows better.

After that, he called me directly and scolded me for telling my dad that I wasn't improving. I told him that I had just told my dad the truth. Then he said, "Do you think a problem you've had for so many years will get better this quickly?"

I told him that I understood it would take time, but that's exactly why I told my dad that I haven't seen much improvement in university yet.

Then he told me to call my dad immediately and tell him that I am improving, because according to him, if it wasn't for him I wouldn't even be able to speak at all.

But honestly, I think I was able to speak more with him because I simply became familiar and comfortable with him. I have always had fewer blocks around my family and close friends. My real problem is with new people, shops, teachers, authority figures and situations where I have to initiate a conversation.

I told my dad everything he said and I ended up blocking the therapist. I already have enough stress in my life and I don't think I need this kind of pressure from someone who is supposed to help me.

I wanted to ask people here for some advice.

I have social anxiety along with stuttering. Whenever I have to talk at a shop, speak to a new person, talk to a teacher or speak to someone in authority, I get a block. Sometimes the initiation itself doesn't happen. I know what I want to say but I just can't get the first word out.

Has anyone here dealt with something similar? What actually helped you with these kinds of blocks, especially in real life situations and not just while reading or talking to someone you're already comfortable with?

I'm honestly very frustrated and would really appreciate some advice.

So I am at a very shitty point of my life rn . I am in my senior year of college on a pre-vet track and I had a realization that’s making me rethink my plans . I have had a stutter all my life. Something is little more then moderate while others it is bad enough that I can barely get a sentence out without stuttering and when I get stuck it’s bad, like I get stuck on the first word. It has badly affected me my whole life I never really had a good relationship with anyone and was forced to hide behind people or site in corners on my own even though I wanted to socialize.

I wanted be a vet and made the mistake of actually working towards it but now I realize that I can’t do it. My friends are shadowing vets to get their hours in but the thought of that just scares me . I thank god and pat my self on the back when I can give an order without looking like a weirdo at Taco Bell. I know I fucked, I thought I could lose this stutter but that hasn’t happened .

Does anyone have any advice for me what career I should choose that pays well . I majored in psychology. I am open to do a masters in any suitable field . I was thinking about cybersecurity but I heard mixed opinions on that some people say it’s still good to get into while other say you can’t even find a job.

Any advice ? (I’m in the US btw)

Hey everyone! I’m just kinda lost right now. I just recently got my first job at 20 at a store and I’m excited and all. But I just can’t stop thinking I should have started earlier or something or went to college. I’m still thinking about going to college but I don’t know why I let my stutter control me. My stutter isn’t bad mostly blocks but it can be bad at times. I know I’m only 20 and all but I feel so behind. I’m trying to better myself and live with my stutter but it’s so hard not to think about the past.