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Not everyone has an internal monologue

ryanandrewlangdon.wordpress.com

21–30 of 904 posts

Re: Not everyone has an internal monologue

#21
The hardest thing for me to come to own up for myself is not just taking responsibility for my own inner monologue, but realizing that thoughts encompass much more than my inner monologue. I have wordless thoughts are deeper, more subtle and these things are thoughts too. I have to take responsibility for these as well.

It makes sense once you think about animals, who don't have a formal language yet clearly are capable of thought.

Re: Not everyone has an internal monologue

#22
post #14

I've never heard my voice in my head. When I hear folks talk about it, I assume something like this scene from a game where the character Jaina is blaming herself for numerous failures. Though perhaps the 1984 version of Dune would be closer? [2] [1] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NDj2aaxixxo [ WoW Spoiler: Realm of Torment] [2] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A54yfyi00dI Dune: Fear and Pain

Can you not "sound out" words in your head while reading? Is that the same thing or something else entirely?

I can, but never have by default. I assume folks are talking about a behavior that is not induced consciously, as if they have their own situational narrator.

Re: Not everyone has an internal monologue

#23

This reminds me of some other recent articles about topics like aphantasia (no visual imagination) and severely deficient autobiographical memory (SDAM). People who have these conditions do not realize how different other people think.

I'm one of those that has aphantasia. No visual or auditory imagination for me, so no running monologue in my head, or view of sentences. Or, if it's happening, I can't hear it or see it. Thoughts come to me as concepts, and sort of just pop into my head. Had no idea until a year or two ago that this wasn't how it worked with everyone.

Re: Not everyone has an internal monologue

#24

This reminds me of some other recent articles about topics like aphantasia (no visual imagination) and severely deficient autobiographical memory (SDAM). People who have these conditions do not realize how different other people think.

I realized a few years ago that I have aphantasia, and it blew my mind that most people could conjure images of things when they closed their eyes (to some greater or lesser degree, but more than my zero degree).

I didn't realize that, for example, "mental image" was not just, like, a metaphor for thinking. When I close my eyes, it's black. Just, black. Well, you know, depending on how bright the lights are, etc.

Re: Not everyone has an internal monologue

#26
Something I discovered within the past year is that if I know a song fairly well, I can "play it" silently in my head, and be entertained. The experience isn't quite as emotionally resonate as listening with headphones, but it's not so far off either. It's useful when I'm bored.

...can anyone else do this? I actually find it supremely weird.

Re: Not everyone has an internal monologue

#27
And then there is Aphantasia[1]. I didn't realize this was a thing. When people spoke about picturing something in my mind, I always assumed they weren't being literal. Discovering they were was shocking. It's such a foreign concept to me, to picture something in my mind literally.

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aphantasia

Re: Not everyone has an internal monologue

#28
I saw this viral tweet and I hoped that was more scientific information to read, because I'm a little confused. I don't see enough information here to even determine which type of person I am. Of course I've always heard of "internal monologue" and of course I think about things using language. But I also don't "hear" anything, and definitely not something that literally sounds like my voice speaking. But if I were to try to explain my thought process, I likely would describe it as myself expressing thoughts using language as if I were speaking.

Obviously this gets deep into the philosophy of qualia, but do we have evidence that there are two very different modes of thinking? Could this not just be different analogies people have adopted to describe their thinking?

An Instagram poll isn't a great tool to study this. I would like to see a psychological or neurological study about this idea. As of now, I'm pretty skeptical that the dichotomy exists. It sounds like the claim that "some people describe their brains like a computer, while some people describe their brains like a library." Computers and libraries are very different physical objects, yes, but the choice of analogy doesn't really tell me much about how people are experiencing their own thought processes.

Of course, if it's true that the majority of people do actually experience auditory hallucinations of their own voice speaking all of their thoughts, then my criticisms here are invalid, and I'm definitely in the other group of people.

Re: Not everyone has an internal monologue

#29
post #20

I wonder if this is related to (forgive the term) grammar-nazi-ism. I'm pretty sure I don't have any inner-monologue, at least the concept of it sounds weird to me. I'm also super picky about grammar: if someone writes "its cold out today" I have to re-read the sentence to try to understand it. I don't "hear" "it's cold" in my head, I parse "its (posessive) cold" which doesn't make any sense, and I have to go back an…

I'd say your grammar nazism comes from the fact that you are visually oriented. The mistake just looks wrong.

And as a visually-oriented person you would also be less likely to have an inner monologue.

Re: Not everyone has an internal monologue

#30

Something I discovered within the past year is that if I know a song fairly well, I can "play it" silently in my head, and be entertained. The experience isn't quite as emotionally resonate as listening with headphones, but it's not so far off either. It's useful when I'm bored. ...can anyone else do this? I actually find it supremely weird.

No, I think that's pretty normal. I do it all the time.

I can even "compose" my own music (it can be any genre, with any type of instruments, and even include voices), but I have no ability to play instruments myself. I'd love to get into music, but just don't have the time.

My literature professor back in college said he "listened to" classical music in his head during his morning runs. I just assumed everyone did it based on sample size 2.

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