Finding Changes in Personality in Speech/Language Therapy Patients

Contact Info

Researcher: Alexander Hammond

Instructor: Josh Gaydos

Phone: (253)-891-5700

Research Question

Is There a Noticeable Personality Difference Between People with Speech & Language Disorders who Take Speech Therapy Compared to Those who Don't?

Problem Statement

The main job of Speech & Language Therapists is to help with any speech and language issues for their patients. Those issues tend to lead to those patients having troubles socializing, which can impact their personality, which impacts their socializing, and so forth. If we can find that there's a noticeable impact on a patient's personality after speech and language therapy, then we can see why that may be, which could lead to a better understanding of how to help people socialize easier.

Method of Inquiry

I will be making a survey, which will include a 50-item Personality Test grading respondents on the Big Five Personality scales, & using those results to group the respondents into three groups; The Patients, The Symptoms, & The General Public. I'll be taking the average scores for each group on each of the five scales & comparing them to each other to see if there's any noticeable difference. The General Public Group scores will be used as a baseline for context, but the other two group's scores will be compared together to come up with the final results.

Value of the Study

There have been studies looking at people with speech or language problems in the past, especially when looking at how they behave socially with others. But, there hasn't been a study that compares people with those problems with people who've taken Speech or Language Therapy to help with those problems. Specifically, when looking at personality, there's been research done on the personalities of Speech & Language Therapists, but not the Patients. This study will attempt to look at if and how Speech and Language Therapy impacts a patient's personality. The results of this could lead to future research comparing patients to non-patients dealing with the same disorders & how speech and language therapy might have an impact.

Initial Hypothesis

When looking at the Big Five Personality Traits, I'm Predicting a Slight but Noticeable Increase Towards more Extraversive, and a Big Change Towards being More Open to Experiences, with No Noticable Changes in the Other Three Scales.

Initial Assumptions

As a Speech Therapy patient myself, I have my own experiences to draw back from. From my experiences in Speech Therapy, it involved one therapist working with either a single patient or a small group of patients, generally by talking to them & having conversations. Depending on what needed to be worked on, a session could just be a conversation.

Definitions

Big Five Personality Traits
- Extraversion
  - How‌ ‌Comfortable‌ ‌Someone‌ ‌is‌ ‌in‌ ‌Social‌ ‌Situations‌
- Agreeableness
  - How Much Someone Cares for Other versus Themselves
- Openness to Experience
  - How Imaginative Someone is
- Conscientiousness
  - How Hard Someone Works to Finish Tasks to their Fullest
- Neuroticism
  - How Emotional Someone Gets

Scales
- Personality Traits
Items
- Questions Used in the Personality Test
Speech/Language Therapy
- Therapy Used to Help People with a Language or Speech(Articulation, Fluency, Voice) Disorder
Disorders
- Language
  - Impaired Comprehension and/or use of Spoken, Written and/or Other Symbol Systems(ASHA 1993)
- Articulation
  - The Atypical Production of Speech Sounds Characterized by Substitutions, Omissions, Additions or Distortions that may Interfere with Intelligibility(ASHA 1993)
- Fluency
  - An Interruption in the Flow of Speaking Characterized by Atypical Rate, Rhythm, and Repetitions in Sounds, Syllables, Words, and Phrases(ASHA 1993)
- Voice
  - The Abnormal Production and/or Absences of Vocal Quality, Pitch, Loudness, Resonance, and/or Duration, which is Inappropriate for an Individual's Age and/or Sex(ASHA 1993)
- ASHA
  - American Speech-Language-Hearing Association

Results

17 Respondents

8 Patients
6 Symptom Havers
3 Others
Not Included in Final Results

Conclusions

(may all be from a lack of responses)

Big Difference in Average Scores on Extraversion Scale
Smaller Difference in Agreeableness, Openness to Experience, & Consciousness Scales
No Real Difference in Neutoricism Scale
Hypothesis Partially Supported
- Correct:
  - Major Difference in Extraversion Scale
  - No Real Difference in Neutoricism Scale
- Incorrect:
  - Clear Differences Found in Agreeableness & Neuroticism Scales
    - Although Not as Major
  - No Major Difference in Openness to Experience Scale
  - Extraversion & Openness to Experience Scores Lower Compared to Patients to Non-patients.

Implications

(may all be from a lack of responses)

There does seem to be some impact on the personality of a speech/language therapy patient. The biggest one shown here being that speech/language therapy patients on average seem to be more introverted.

Next Steps

Redo this experiment to get more results & see if the results stay
Find why/how taking speech/language therapy would make a patient more introverted
- Maybe the title of "Speech/Language Therapy Patient" makes someone not as social.
- Maybe my questions focused too much on large group situations & these patients are more suited for small group/one-on-one situations.
Compare patients to themselves before & after starting speech/language therapy to find direct causation.

Important Sources

American Speech-Language-Hearing Association. (1993, January 1). Definitions of communication disorders and variations. American Speech-Language-Hearing Association. Retrieved from https://www.asha.org/policy/rp1993-00208/
Back, Heather M., The Effects of Communication Disorders on Social Development (2010). CMC Senior Theses. Paper 77. https://scholarship.claremont.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1079&context=cmc_theses#:~:text=Children%20with%20communication%20disorders%20have,et%20al.%2C%202002).
Kajonius, P. J., & Johnson, J. A. (2019). Assessing the structure of the five factor model of personality (IPIP-NEO-120) in the public domain. Europe's Journal of Psychology, 15(2), 260-275. doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.5964/ejop.v15i2.1671
Langbecker, D., Snoswell, C. L., Smith, A. C., Verboom, J., & Caffery, L. J. (2020). Long-term effects of childhood speech and language disorders: A scoping review. South African Journal of Childhood Education (SAJCE), 10(1) doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.4102/sajce.v10i1.801
Norton, Whitney, A Study of Personality Types Found Within the Speech-Language Pathology Profession and the Communication Sciences and Disorders Major (2014). Honors College. 148. https://digitalcommons.library.umaine.edu/honors/148
PLESEA-CONDRATOVICI, C., MUTICA, M., BURLEA, L. S., KANTOR, C., Alexandru, B. C., & CIUBARA, A. (2018). The influence of speech disorders on the social insertion of children and adolescents in the region of moldova., 198-217. Retrieved from https://www.proquest.com/scholarly-journals/influence-speech-disorders-on-social-insertion/docview/2160714599/se-2
Wash. Adm. Code. Code ch. 392-172a, § 01035. Child with a disability or student eligible for special education services.

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