University students' perceptions of pre-school and kindergarten children who stutter.

Unlabelled: To determine how early "the stuttering stereotype" is assigned, 160 university students rated a hypothetical vignette depicting either a 3-, 4-, 5-, or 6-year-old with or without the statement "He stutters". A factor analysis of the semantic differential scale showed a three-factor solution comprised of 17 of the 25 bi-polar adjective pairs. The factor labeled personality showed significantly more negative ratings for 2-, 4-, 5-, or 6-year-old children based on the inclusion of the "He stutters" sentence.