Speech and Voice: Their Evolution, Pathology and Therapy
- Author:
Leopold Stein, M.D. Methuen. 1942.
15s.
Written primarily as a textbook for students of speech- therapy this important book makes a valuable and original contribution to the psycho-pathology of child- hood. Dr Stein’s evolutionary interpretation of speech abnormalities illuminates some of the dark places of therapeutic work. The fundamental concept of growth, though accepted and applied without question in the study of the motor, intellectual, social and linguistic behaviour of children, had not hitherto been applied exhaustively and rigorously to the study of speech defects. The mass of observations made in this field lacked cohesion and awaited a unifying principle. It is satis- fying that it is again the principle of evolution, the idea of growing by a natural process, that enables Dr Stein to arrange and systematize most of the known abnor- malities of speech. Our knowledge in this sphere begins now to take on the appearance of an ordered whole. For those engaged in speech-therapy and speech- training the value of Dr Stein’s theory lies in the fact, well established by him on a basis of long experience, ?j-lg
that this theory aids diagnosis, makes forecast possi’d and suggests new and very promising methods of tre?. ment. Dr Stein shows how the speech defects of a cni or an adult may be recognized as a definite, known 1eV / of normal speech-development. Under the stress unfavourable conditions speech may have failed to gr?. normally beyond this level, or, having grown beyond H may have been reduced to this lower level by a loss more recently acquired speech habits. We are alrea^ familiar, in other fields of child development, with ^ checking of normal growth and with regression to earl’, stages, concepts that have been extraordinarily fruit1 in therapeutic work. Now speech-therapy can fall line with other and well established psycho-therapea1 measures. The speech therapist, with firm ground una ^ his feet, is in a position to estimate the severity oI , disorder, the probable course that it will take, if untreate > and the prospect of improvement under treatment. Brief quotations from Dr Stein’s book will serve . illustrate his theory in its application to Stammering ” Our elucidation will show the particular feature o1 stammer refers clearly to developmental stages of 1 ^ disorder, which stages again reflect certain patterns . action in the stratification of speech.” ” If we succe in reaching a level that has remained intact?and this , what all theories of psycho-pathology ultimately to do?we may hope that by proper means we shall able to help nature in rebuilding the hierarchy of Patt^r0f which would satisfy the needs both of the patient and his social environment.” C.A.S-
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