Expanding on part of her talk at the Cardiff Open Day last year, Dr Rosemarie Hayhow suggests that a focus on learning through trial and error may be more useful than a focus on 'succeeding' or 'failing'.

Various factors can lead people who stammer to develop negative views of their own self-worth. One way in which our beliefs can influence how we evaluate ourselves is whether we tend towards being an incremental theorist or an entity theorist.¹

An incremental theorist takes the view that we develop a mastery of skills through learning, trial and error etc. This happens over time. People with this view attend to process as well as the final outcome.

"Being an entity theorist may lead to feelings of vulnerability when setbacks occur."

Entity theorists are more directed towards their goals or targets, and may think more in terms of passing or failing. This in turn may encourage an 'all or nothing' way of looking at things. Being an entity theorist is OK when things go well, but it may lead to feelings of vulnerability when setbacks occur. Entity theorists are more likely to feel they have failed and their sense of self-worth may be threatened when they don't achieve the goals they and others have set for them. Incremental theorists are better able to view setbacks as part of the learning process, which leaves their sense of self-worth intact when they encounter difficulties.

We can speculate on how children might learn to favour an incremental over an entity way of seeing things. The current fixation with targets and league tables based on exam results is likely to encourage an entity approach towards education. Stickers and stars for achievement rather than effort also encourage the view that outcome is more important than process. If we fail to reach a target and we do not value the process behind this, then we may judge ourselves to have failed in relation to those who have achieved. This is not to say that competition is wrong - but to be a loser is not a comfortable position, nor is it likely to lead to the development of potential.

Approaches to stammering

How might an emphasis on results rather than process tie in with stammering? It is possible that stammering might lend itself to an entity view - Can I say this word? Can I be as fluent as I think others are? Am I stammering? These sorts of questions can lead to yes / no judgements. When feelings of self-worth get tied up with speaking performance, the speaker is vulnerable during times of speaking difficulty.

It may be more useful to ask questions like: did I get my message across? Did my conversation partners have a chance to say what they wanted to say? Was I able to think more positively before I started speaking? These will still potentially have yes / no answers. However, they encourage the speaker to reflect more on the interaction and not just pass judgement based on whether or not they stammered, and by implication whether they have 'failed' or 'succeeded'.

Adopting an incremental approach to life encourages an emphasis on learning and development, and the gradual acquisition of new skills. Viewed this way life is a journey, and our achievements and setbacks are part of the larger and longer story. Working on speaking can become one of the journeys within this larger story, and is influenced by other experiences and developments. Questioning what we can learn from an event rather than feeling mortified by our self-defined failure can not only facilitate development but also can increase our resilience to the setbacks that are an inevitable part of learning. Verbal communication is complex: involving thinking, language, fine motor control, social factors and emotional responses. An over-emphasis on motor control can interfere with the other areas, and heightened negative emotion can affect our feelings of self-worth as well as the recovery time we need after adverse events. Stickers and star charts have their place in learning and skill development, but in the longer term we need a sense of achievement that is grounded in developing competence and resilience.

Rosemarie Hayhow is a Speech and Language Therapist and researcher. For a fuller version of her Cardiff talk see Connect or divide?, where she looks at Personal Construct Therapy and how stammering may develop to become a way of life, attempted solutions becoming a part of the problem, as well as thoughts on the Lidcombe Program for young children.

¹Molden, D. & Dweck, C. (2000) Meaning and Motivation. in Intrinsic and Extrinsic Motivation, eds. Sansone & Harakiewicz.

From the Summer 2009 issue of Speaking Out, page 13.