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After a discussion of the basis of speech ; the different levels of the mind; the growth of conscience ; anxiety ; emotional patterns, and the family and the social pattern, there follow a description of stuttering, some current theories, the authors' views on the cause and treatment, other theories of treatment, the prognosis, and a consideration as to how parents, teachers, the public and the stutterer can help overcome this defect.
With others, the authors believe in the emotional etiology of stuttering. The original blocking of the rhythm of speech (stuttering) occurs from mild states of fear, embarrassment or anxiety, reenforced by superimposed conditioned fears. There is need of study in each case of the cause or causes of the anxiety or fear. Stutterers usually suffer from chronic anxiety—"misplaced, misdirected, excessive anxiety about something in the unconscious life which attaches itself to conscious material." The authors do not fully explain the nature