Talking to yourself doesn’t mean you’re crazy

Talking to yourself doesn’t mean you’re crazy

By Margaret Rogers

It is not uncommon for people to talk to themselves.  Most of us talk to ourselves at least every few days whilst others may do it every hour or so.  Studies have previously suggested that when children talk to themselves this can have much benefit particularly in situations such as when they are tying their shoelaces – they talk through each step of the process out loud.  Researchers have now studied whether there is any benefit to adults.

Some people joke that talking to themselves is the only intelligent conversation that they have and at least they know that someone is listening! 

The study, which was conducted by Gary Lupyan of the University of Wisconsin, and Daniel Swingley of the University of Pennsylvania, is published in the Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology.

Lupyan and Swingley carried out a series of experiments to find out whether talking to oneself can be helpful when searching for particular objects.

The observation that people often mutter out loud when trying to find something was the inspiration behind the study. Most of us have done this, for example when we can’t find that roll of sticky tape in the draw whilst rummaging through all the other bits and pieces that we don’t use often.  ‘Sticky tape’, ‘sticky tape’, ‘sticky tape’…’where’s the sticky tape’.

In the first of the experiments, participants looked at 20 pictures of various objects and then asked to find one particular one.  In some trials the participants saw a text label which instructed to find a particular object.  The text, for example, read ‘find the teapot’.  In other trials the participants were asked to search again whilst saying the word for what they were searching.  The researchers found that by speaking the word out loud the participants found the objects more quickly.

In the third trial, the participants went on a ‘virtual’ shopping trip.  They saw pictures of common items which can be found on the shelves in a supermarket.   It was found that in this situation too, the items were found more quickly when the word for what they were searching was said out loud. 

So the next time you lose something it may be helpful to actually say the word for what you have lost whilst you search, even if you get some funny looks from others while you are doing it.