Participants that stutter

Participants will complete a speech production task with 2 conditions (stuttered, non-stuttered) while undergoing functional MRI to assess brain activity. Brain activity will be compared within subjects for the 2 conditions. The intervention is the combination of tasks delivered to all participants. The speaking task is the intervention (modifying agent) and the MRI is a measurement tool, not a therapeutic or modifying agent.

The Blood-oxygen-level-dependent (BOLD) signal reflects changes in blood oxygenation levels that are associated with neural activity. It is measured using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and reported in arbitrary units (a.u.). The BOLD response provides an indirect index of localized brain activity during task performance, with increased signal indicating greater activation in a given brain region relative to baseline or a comparison condition. In this study, BOLD signal differences will be compared within participants across two speech production tasks: (1) stuttered speech and (2) non-stuttered speech. Each participant will complete the speech task on several of the MRI visits, which varies per participant (total amount of time spent will be the same across participants).