More than a game
The research team used Rhythm Workers, a rhythm game developed by team member Simone Dalla Bella, an UdeM psychology professor and co-director of BRAMS. The game has been used with other clinical groups, including people with Parkinson’s disease and ADHD.
The concept is simple: players tap the screen of a cellphone in time with the music being played, building virtual structures as their accuracy improves.
In the pilot study, children aged 9 to 12 who stutter played the game for three weeks, averaging 300 minutes of practice. Compared to a control group playing a non-rhythmic game, the Rhythm Workers players exhibited remarkable improvement.
They made fewer speech-motor errors and showed reduced disfluency in both spontaneous and read-aloud speech. They also demonstrated better attention control.
Most notably, the children whose rhythmic skills improved the most also experienced the greatest reduction in stuttering.
Why rhythm matters
According to Falk, training the brain to process rhythm without speaking can indirectly enhance speech because rhythm and speech share common neural resources. Promoting plasticity in these neural networks can lead to improvements in other motor channels.
“Synchronizing to a beat engages a broad brain network, including the basal ganglia, thalamus, motor cortex and cerebellum,” Falk explained. “This network is critical for fine motor control, particularly timing—knowing when I am able to pronounce the next syllable— and the synchronization of auditory and motor signals."
In people who stutter, this network often shows alterations, leading to difficulties predicting the right moment to begin a sound. The result is blocks, repetitions and drawn-out syllables.
“Stuttering is essentially a motor speech deficit related to problems synchronizing what we articulate with what we expect to hear when we speak,” Falk said. “So training synchronization nonverbally through musical rhythm could help.”
A tool to complement therapy
While the results are promising for a non-invasive, fun, home-based intervention, Falk urges caution: the study had a small sample size of just 21 participants. A larger, randomized controlled trial—ideally across Canada —is now being planned.
Falk also stresses the importance of treating stuttering holistically.
“Stuttering is more than a motor challenge,” she said. “It affects self-confidence, social interaction and emotional well-being, especially in adolescence. Any effective treatment must therefore be comprehensive, combining work on fluency and acceptance, psychosocial support, and a caring environment.”
The goal, therefore, is not to replace speech therapy but to complement existing therapies with nonverbal rhythmic training.
Still, the idea that something as simple as tapping along to the beat could help children speak more smoothly is music to anyone's ears.
