The type of teenage lingo-ist recently parodied in a song about “Valley Girls” by Frank and Moon Unit Zappa could, like, carry inadequate communications skills into adulthood, says Lillian Glass, a speech pathologist and communications professor at the University of Southern California.
Ms. Glass says the problem with such speech is not so much the lingo itself (“fer sure” [absolutely], “grody to the max” [infinitely disgusting], etc.), but the speech patterns that accompany it.
“‘Val-Speakers’ are monotone, dull, nasal, and they don’t open their mouths,” Ms. Glass said.
Use of speech fillers such as “you know” and “like,” an empty vocabulary full of all-purpose words such as “awesome,” and excessively fast speech are other “Val-speak” symptoms, Ms. Glass said.
Ms. Glass lets the “Val-speaker” hear and see herself (or himself) in action with audio and video tape-recorders.
“Sometimes they don’t believe it’s them,” she said.