Genomewide Study Makes ‘Quantum Leap’ in Understanding Stuttering

In The King’s Speech, the 2010 biopic that portrays the United Kingdom’s King George VI’s lifelong struggle with his severe stutter, the king’s father tries to quell his son’s stammering by shouting, “Relax! Relax!” as if it were something he could simply control. Decades of research has shown stuttering is, in fact, an involuntary condition that is highly heritable, though its causes are multifaceted and murky. Now, some of the murk has cleared.