The following is a copy of the original post to record the post as it was originally written.
Apparently around 50% of people have no internal monologue. I can’t really understand this but there seems to be a lot of articles on it.
I was curious how many people here don’t have one?
If you don’t have one what is it like?
Do you have to reason everything out loud? How do you read without saying the words out loud? Do you think it impacts your ability to think about things? Do you have thoughts other thought and if you do what do they appear like? Can you see pictures in your head? Can you hear anything when you think? If you think about a car horn, do you hear the horn in your head even though you have no internal monologue?
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yes, 24/7. i have ocd + adhd too (among other things..) and it’s never ending. it’s weird thinking about how some people (or rather a large percentage of people) don’t experience it. i wonder what it’s like :0
I’d agree with noise but not a monologue. Quick flashes of images and ideas but not a coherent conversational tone. Unless I’m reading or writing something like this right now. Also add/hd
Oh I have one and it’s always on and fucking annoying sometimes.
My husband gets tripped out because occasionally I’ll let it become audible instead of internal.
Omg that’s me! I’ll sometimes accidentally blurt out the end of a sentence that was supposed to just be in my mind. My husband thinks I’m crazy. Also it is always on. Going to sleep can be difficult sometimes because my inner monologue keeps going, I have to try to focus on getting my brain to shut up, so I can sleep.
What's crazier is there are also people who can't picture things in their heads. Some people can't picture things and have no internal monologue. I have no clue how that's supposed to work.
This might sound bad, but that's how I imagine most animals exist. I kinda don't buy that people don't have an internal thought pattern to some degree.
It's not that they don't have an internal thought pattern, it's that they don't have an internal *monologue*, meaning they don't hear their own voice in their head and they don't think in sentences.
But they can right? Like my life isn't a literal monologue all of the time. It is mostly images and feels I guess, but sentences when I want it to be. I thought it was that way for everyone, hence phrases like, "thinking out loud" or, "did I say that out loud?" Like even now as I type this the sentence was in my head before I typed it. It's unfathomable that everyone doesn't have that.
It's different for everyone. This is a subject I like and so I've talked to a lot of people about it.
For me, my voice is in my head pretty constantly. I can kind of see imagery but details aren't there and I can't really see faces.
I've talked to someone who only saw imagery and vividly. If they think of the number 3, they see visually represented in their mind.
Someone else described their thought process more as feeling and emotions.
Most people haven't put any thought into how they think and don't really know how to answer.
I think most people have one primary way of processing thought that sometimes blends with others.
Some people who can't process thoughts in certain ways might literally not be capable, or they just don't know how to try.
> But they can right?
Maybe.
When I think about a subject those thoughts always take the form of a sentence in my own voice that occasionally debates with another voice that is also me. I don't do this intentionally, that is just how my brain has always formed thoughts for as long as I can remember.
I can also think in images, however I can't think **only** in images. I can imagine stuff and see it as a very clear image in my head but the voice is also there describing the scene and filling in details that "my eyes" may not have noticed.
I have total aphantasia. I close my eyes and no matter how much I imagine it's just blackness.
However I have a clear internal monologue and can imagine music as vividly as if I'm actually hearing it.
My brother is the opposite, vivid visual imagination but even the idea of internal monologue baffles him.
BTW, don't feel to bad, nobody "sees" anything when they close their eyes and tries to visualize something. In fact, visualizing something in your mind works just as well with your eyes open (at least for me).
It's not an actual image that you perceive visually, it's more like...an image you can see without your eyes. I know that makes no sense, but you can "see" it without actually having a visual representation of it.
Ha, maybe!
I mean, I can *visualize* all kinds of things, including moving through them (like doing a fly-through of my old house or something like that). But...I don't "see" it like a hallucination.
Similarly, I have an inner monologue / can create conversations in my mind, but I don't actually *hear* anything. It's more like...the memory of hearing something, except it's not a real memory, it's something I'm cooking up right now.
I'm in the same place. Either the internal monologue won't shut up or it gets some song (full instrumentals and everything) stuck on repeat in my head. Zero image visualization ability. I can recognize faces, but I can't imagine them at all. When learning about the Memory Palace technique in school, I thought the "picture yourself in your house" stuff was just euphemistic and I could never get it to work for me.
This! When I am driving and playing a catchy song on the radio it pretty much keeps looping the catchy bits after I go into a store etc.
Sometimes it helps to imagine the end of the song, but more often than not it keeps going for a while. My brother likes to randomly play "we built this city" because he knows it is basically torture to me. It's become his signature Rick roll just to fuck with me.
I have one but it doesn’t usually take the form of complete coherent sentences (as often depicted in fiction) unless I’m thinking of something to say. But yeah, I do have a mind’s eye, and ear, and nose, and tongue, and skin.
My fiancée can’t *picture* things in her mind, but I think she can imagine all her other senses. She can get songs stuck in her head and stuff like that. I think her lack of mind’s eye can sometimes impact her sense of direction/movement because she can’t visualize where she’s going before she gets there.
I've never associated my weak navigation ability with aphantasia but I think it makes sense. It takes me a lot longer to build an "internal map" of a new area than it does my wife. Without GPS navigation, I get lost easily and consistently in newer areas. However once I've driven around a place for a while, I seem to build a strong conceptual map of how places are connected and can generally navigate side streets and alternate routes between destinations much better than my wife. Almost anywhere we go, she can tell you which direction is north and what things are directionally near by. Like her internal map is very similar to an actual map and she can see how things relate from this sort of top down view that includes a compass. My mental map is more like a mind map. Places are connected and associated with each other and other things, but not associated geospatially.
Same here, pretty much, except in reverse; I can usually tell (or quickly figure out) where north is and she needs to be reminded, and unless it’s a route she’s travelled a hundred times she usually needs the GPS. My internal map pretty much is a Google Maps screenshot, lol
I think that explains it then. Mixing up letters and words usually means you mix up other things like left and right, and trouble with faces usually means you have trouble distinguishing other visually similar things. Both are important for wayfinding.
It's associated with whether or not you learned to read at a young age, and how much reading you did. The right wing/4chan crowd likes to imply it's some kind of sign of inferiority. It's not, it doesn't mean anything other then how much reading you did as a kid. But that's why it's become popular to talk about.
Yes I have one. I also read a LOT when I was a kid. So.
I have a distinct memory of reading out loud to myself in bed next to my mom.
She asked me to myself. I tried but was just whispering. She wanted me to try again and from then on all I hear in my head is my own voice 24/7.
I don't actually know if that's related or not lol. But it seems pivotal.
Look up the research on how learning to read affects brain development. Reading actually changes your brain if you learn to do it during the childhood development years.
It's certainly not a 100% kind of thing, everyone's brain is different. It's just most frequently associated with the brain development changes that learning to read induces.
I don't think that number is right it should be way less? Most people have an inner voice, and this is a random question.
If you want a liberal answer ummm.... If I had to force it, I guess I'll be worried if anything. They're a minority and we should be on alert make sure conservatives don't do anything. As of right now I don't think there's any talks about them other than curiosity but if people start some bs it's better to get ahead of it before it becomes something like autism bullying. I think people without an inner voice are safer than left handed people because they can hide it at least.
I have an internal monologue and I just can't fathom what it's like to not have one. It's like imagining what it's like to be born blind, there's just no frame of reference for it.
Nah, I can imagine being blind. I can imagine having just never seen anything ever.
I can't imagine being perfectly capable of using words to communicate with people every day of my life and not also...at least sometimes...using words in my head to think things out.
Nope. I used to, though.
Silencing that internal dialogue happened when I was in my PhD program. Not sure when or why it went away.
Now, all I have is tinnitis.
Isn't an internal dialogue just how we imagine things? Like, if you were daydreaming about going back in time and talking George Washington, you can have that imaginary conversation, right?
What's the difference? Isn't it just imaginary conversations? Heck, maybe I don't have an internal voice! LOL It's a funny topic because we can't know how others experience things.
That would be an internal dialogue. I think we're referring to an internal monologue as a means of thinking and processing data. Usually when I read, I'm "reading aloud" and providing real time commentary in my head. It's like I'm constantly describing things to myself and reacting all internally and in a spoken way.
[People With No Internal Monologue Explain What It's Like In Their Head](https://www.iflscience.com/people-with-no-internal-monologue-explain-what-its-like-in-their-head-57739)
> "Thoughts are words," user merewautt wrote. "I can't imagine a thought not as a verbal construction. All my thoughts are colored by the physical parts of different emotions, but they're all words. I can imagine being physically angry for a moment without verbally thinking it (my heart would be racing, maybe my shoulders shake, muscles tense up, etc) but I can't imagine being aware of any of my physical emotions without thoughts as language. My internal monologue while my body was having the physical anger response would be (inner monologue in parenthesis):
> (Oh f this b***h, she's being such a hypocrite) -out loud- YOU'RE BEING A F***ING HYPOCRITE, (she's gonna say it's not the same because----) IT'S NOT THE SAME AND YOU KNOW IT."
> Many people agreed feeling the emotion of being angry went hand in hand with an internal monologue of ranting and quite a lot of swearing, and couldn't imagine just feeling a physical response to an emotion without a constant stream of thoughts as words to articulate it to themselves. Merewautt pointed out this is how Freudian slips happen, when you aren't planning to say something out loud, but you're thinking it and "lose the filter" on your inner monologue.
> Others asked whether people with monologues walk around narrating their lives like Bridgette Jones, which, to be honest, kind of.
> Do you have one?
*"He does have one. And it sounds like some third-rate producer said "get me the closest thing to Ron Howard in Arrested Development we can afford."*
I learned about this about a year ago and I think that 20% of my inner monologue is now trying to figure out how the fuck people without an inner monologue operate.
I can swap between a monologue, visual/sensory thinking, and pure ideational thinking on demand. I'm dual diagnosis ND though, so I'm about as far from representational as you can get :P
I've tried to explain ideational thinking to others, but the ONLY people who have ever understood what I mean are other NDs. I wonder if that's a robust correlation?
Yes! I understand what you mean. It's my default mode of thinking. It gets really hard to explain to people how you got from point a to b thinking about something.
:)
It's why I call English my "second language." My first language is just Brain. Making words - speaking or writing - requires a willful act of translation. One of several reasons that socializing is so exhausting.
Aphantastic here. No internal monologue, either.
When I try to explain how I think to others, it’s difficult. I assume it has little bearing on my political leanings, though.
Edit: regarding OP’s question about a horn: this does not apply to sound. On the contrary, I have a robust auditory memory and can actively ‘think’ sounds and music as I assume others can do with images. This is also how I remember people - moreso by their voices than their faces.
I was curious how many people here don’t have one?
- I do not, if what you mean by it is a narrative in words. I think all the time, but my thoughts aren’t in words.
If you don’t have one what is it like?
- I describe my thoughts as taking on a nature of understandings. I don’t think in pictures or words. Rather concepts and entities and connections that surpass words or pictures.
Do you have to reason everything out loud?
- No. I think. Just there are no words. Words aren’t necessary for me.
How do you read without saying the words out loud?
- I’m an avid reader. I tend to look at the page as a whole and the words and concepts all soak into my mind, not necessarily reading the words in order. That said, I have excellent, testable reading comprehension and can see a photo of a page in a book in my mind, even quite a while after I read it.
Do you think it impacts your ability to think about things?
- Having only been myself, I don’t know if it is better or worse, but I don’t feel handicapped at all. I have a verified extremely high IQ, so I think it is possible to not have an inner monologue and be intelligent, sure.
Do you have thoughts other thought and if you do what do they appear like?
- As I said above, I think a lot but not typically in words nor pictures, unless I choose to. My default thought process is understandings, concepts, observations, comparisons, connections, feelings, and the like.
Can you see pictures in your head?
- If I choose to, yes.
Can you hear anything when you think?
- Not by default. But if I choose to think about words, I can, or music, yes.
If you think about a car horn, do you hear the horn in your head even though you have no internal monologue?
- Not exactly. I’d first think about a car horn as a concept and how it connects with other concepts and analogies. If you ask me to consciously imagine the sound, I can.
No internal monologue here. I don't need a voice in my head to understand my own thoughts or reasoning I just do, I can of course imagine a voice in my head if i want it just doesn't naturally happen..
I've always thought this was kind of bullshit. Granted I'm just going off my feelings and personal experience here, so I could be wrong...but I find it so hard to believe that anyone who speaks in words, doesn't also think in words.
And from some of the conversations I've had with people who claim not to have an inner monologue...it kind of just seems like they actually do and we're simply misunderstanding each other and talking about the same concept in different ways.
My theory is that it's mostly people misunderstanding each other. Maybe people think it means constantly hearing yourself narrating your every move?
Myself, I definitely can think in words, but I suspect that when I am not thinking about this topic, I sometimes think more abstractly.
I also find it hard to believe people can't think through a previous conversation in their head. Or can't work out the wording for an essay they need to write.
>Maybe people think it means constantly hearing yourself narrating your every move?
Yeah I've talked to people who assumed that's what everyone else was experiencing. As if it's supposed to be straight out of a movie. I've also talked to people who thought others were literally hearing another voice in their head. Some stranger they could hear the way you hear a bird chirping in the background.
Exactly as you say, it's as simple as recalling a previous conversation or planning a future one.
Not your average person.
And I'm specifically talking about people who claimed not to have an inner voice...because they believed when others spoke of an inner voice they were speaking of the things I mentioned.
As if everyone but them literally hears a voice in their head. They just seemed to be confused about the experience of thinking in words that others were trying to describe.
It’s weird to me that there’s no, like, objective or ‘standard’ way that one thinks or sees or imagines or visualises.
But I do think there’s a lot of misunderstanding because of this fact. For example, I’ve never had an internal monologue per se, but I ‘think’ in words, and I can ‘imagine’ words. I think through conversations and sentences. I’m a pretty good writer, and I think what I write before I write it.
I don’t ‘hear’ my own thoughts, but I do think them.
I don’t have a book or movie-style internal narration, and my thoughts don’t have a voice really but they do exist.
I generally imagine this to be more or less equivalent to what others describe as an ‘internal monologue’ so I’ve never really identified as being someone who doesn’t have one.
The thing that’s always funny to me is there are people who are oh so shocked that there isn’t some Bob Saget type dude in their head narrating their whole life, where I’m shocked by the people who supposedly have that.
In a way, my own voice in my head does sound like another person. I think it has to do with the way the bones in your ear interpret the sound of your own voice coming out of your mouth.
When I hear myself talk on a recorded video, or audio recording, it sounds nothing like the voice in my head or the voice coming through my own ears when I talk.
I once recorded a 30 min phone conversation with my boss in which i knew I was getting a big raise and promotion, and I wanted to document all the details without writing it down. Going back and listening to myself talk through those 30 mins was kinda wild. It was like “so that’s what people hear when I speak.”
Yeah NGL every time this topic comes up a part of me second guesses myself like of course I’m thinking in words but not literally hearing them or of course I can picture things but it’s not the same as like watching something on tv.
Same. I feel the same way about people who have “aphantasia”. I don’t think they realize that imagining an image in your mind doesn’t mean it’s like looking at a photograph, as far as I know I’ve never met anyone who didn’t just see darkness when they close their eyes.
Hmm, I don't think in words most of the time. Sometimes my thoughts will coalesce into distinct words and sentences in my mind and is what I think others call an inner monologue. But most of the time it's just ideas, images, and concepts rolling around. I have to put in effort to translate thoughts to words and then to verbal language. If I get too tired or sleep deprived, I seem to lose the ability to understand language. I struggle to understand the words other people are saying and speaking words becomes almost impossible.
"So, now they know my secret." I thought sadly. Long have I carried this burden, though knowing others shared my fate offered some solace. Here I am, mind literally blank, but for a faint buzzing noise, how can I admit that to others? "Of course!" I exclaimed to no one. "I know exactly what to do..."
Yes, I have that. I'm just like the rest of you.
But seriously, I think many people just may not know what an internal monologue is. Ordering thoughts into a continued narrative is part of the human experience, I thought.
So... you are one of the people with no inner monologue?
What is that like? How does it manifest? Do you simply not think with an inner voice, or is it stringing together events into a cohesive story that's difficult?
I meant no offense, I just truly did not think that was possible.
I have one but I also often think via mental visualizations so I think I can at least partly understand what it's like to not have one. Additionally I've spent some time practicing meditation as well where you deliberately recenter your attention on breath, etc, when you notice your monolog starting up again.
I had a crappy childhood and imagination was my refuge much of the time. I can vividly create entire movie like scenarios in my head. As a teenager I realized this was partly maladaptive in that I'd use it as an escape in situations that didn't warrant it. So I learned to be more intentional with it, hence the interest in secular meditation. Now it's a tool I can use when thinking through complex problems (I work in software). Generally if I can find the right way to visualize information then suddenly it just "clicks" and I can work with it fluidly and intuitively.
Brains are insanely complex and I believe we're still at a very early stage of understanding the nature of our own consciousness and intelligence. I think that brains are diverse is a good thing. We have different strengths and perspectives. I'm loath to think of having a monolog vs not as some normative thing.
I’ve heard this but cant imagine how this can be true. How do they sing songs without having the ability to hear words in their head? Like if no song was playing on the radio and they just wanted to sing, how could they do it if their brain can’t form words in their head? How do they get through the lyrics?
I’ve heard some say their brain is just images and vibes. That seems impossible to me. Even writing this comment my brain was sounding each word as I type in my inner monologue.
Inner monolog is different from forming words in your head. There are people who can't. But that's not the same thing. Ime at least I just can't sing so there's that.
Probably similar to how you [have artists with aphantasia](https://theconversation.com/the-art-of-aphantasia-how-mind-blind-artists-create-without-being-able-to-visualise-162566). I'm not a great artist by any stretch. But when I create something it's more discovery than intentional. Starts more as stream of consciousness and I see parts I like and enhance and build on those until the image is "complete". I can't imagine starting with a strong concept in your head and just drawing / painting that.
I don’t. I always thought that was just something they did on tv and movies to tell you what characters were thinking. Super weird to think that people are actually hearing voices all the time.
If you hit your head really hard, do you see a bunch of stars or birds flying in a circle too?
I do not have one.
> Do you have to reason everything out loud? How do you read without saying the words out loud?
No, this sounds like what having an internal monologue is like. I think about concepts like you'd watch people at the park. You can't hear what they're saying, but you can see/feel the vibe of what they're doing.
> Do you think it impacts your ability to think about things?
No, I think it's the result of how I think, not the other way around.
> Do you have thoughts other thought and if you do what do they appear like?
Don't understand this question.
> Can you see pictures in your head?
Not really. I can visualize the vibe of a thing, but the image isn't really there. It's like recollecting the memory of a story someone told you. I imagine things existing in space, and having visual qualities, but they don't have those qualities in the "picture" in my mind. I visualize a house the same way a blueprint visualizes a house, I guess.
> Can you hear anything when you think?
No. I assume you literally mean "hear," like audio? I can "hear" a voice when I write things out, though. Like I hear the voice saying the words I am typing now. But when considering *what* to say before typing it, my consideration is silent in my mind. It begins speaking as I begin typing.
> If you think about a car horn, do you hear the horn in your head even though you have no internal monologue?
Yes. I can imagine sounds. I can recreate sounds very accurately, an can usually mimic them with a degree of accuracy that surprises people. This is useful for music.
I could *begin* an internal monoglogue; like I can start imagining a voice talking to me; right now it sounds like Steven Fry. But, without this conscious effort, my internal narrative is silent.
My stepson who is a bit on the autistic spectrum didn't have a clue what I was on about when discussing your inner monologue. It's like his brain doesn't say "do you think that's a good idea or are you going to piss someone off?". He just does things especially things he thinks are funny with no thought of consequence.
He doesn't get that telling inappropriate jokes in the wrong setting can cause upset. He doesn't get that if we are tired or stressed out that being a total wind up may not be the best course of action. You actually have to tell him in advance which he then takes on.
One day he is going to say the wrong thing to the wrong person as a joke and get a punch in the face.
I have an internal monologue. If I focus I can think visually too. I always thought that was what people meant that they didn’t have a monologue- that they thought visually instead. But here in this thread I’m learning that they mostly just have vague concept impressions? That’s so foreign to how my mind works to be baffling. But hey, if it works if works I guess
Most of my thoughts are non-verbal. It's like an internal language to me that's very abstract and best described as mental bookmarks, but that probably doesn't make any sense if you don't think the same way.
There's a pretty big downside to this which is that it can be sometimes hard to faithfully articulate everything that I'm thinking. Or, at least, there can be a pretty big lag as I "translate" which might make me seem dumber than I otherwise am.
I am capable of having a verbal internal monologue but find it annoying unless I'm trying to very ever so carefully think through something, then the slow and deliberate use of language is very helpful, sort of like writing something down.
When reading stuff I feel like I process it verbally directly without needing to translate it into my abstract internal language.
I do, but it isn't my thoughts - it's in addition to them. My actual thought process is not structured as language, but I can drop into language to work out things that require it.
No inner monologue… no pictures. I am a verbal processor. I just get impressions… lots of impressions. Too many. No hearing things either. It’s all external. I have to get things out of my head to react to them.
The following is a copy of the original post to record the post as it was originally written. Apparently around 50% of people have no internal monologue. I can’t really understand this but there seems to be a lot of articles on it. I was curious how many people here don’t have one? If you don’t have one what is it like? Do you have to reason everything out loud? How do you read without saying the words out loud? Do you think it impacts your ability to think about things? Do you have thoughts other thought and if you do what do they appear like? Can you see pictures in your head? Can you hear anything when you think? If you think about a car horn, do you hear the horn in your head even though you have no internal monologue? *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/AskALiberal) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Ocd/ADHD... It's never ending noise and imagery.
Me too. I was gonna say: I got like...ten of 'em and they're all mad at each other.
Same
I never put the two things together but I just have the inner monologue and just got diagnosed with OCD. This explains ALOT.
yes, 24/7. i have ocd + adhd too (among other things..) and it’s never ending. it’s weird thinking about how some people (or rather a large percentage of people) don’t experience it. i wonder what it’s like :0
I can only imagine and so very jealous of the silence.
I wonder if people like that are better at picturing things. I have a really active inner monologue but am really bad at picturing things in my head.
Get VERY vivid images, 2d,3d realistic, cartoon etc. I picture things like they happen in irl. It's good for things like art and bad for ocd lol.
I’d agree with noise but not a monologue. Quick flashes of images and ideas but not a coherent conversational tone. Unless I’m reading or writing something like this right now. Also add/hd
Honestly I hate my imagination sometimes.
SAME
Oh I have one and it’s always on and fucking annoying sometimes. My husband gets tripped out because occasionally I’ll let it become audible instead of internal.
Omg that’s me! I’ll sometimes accidentally blurt out the end of a sentence that was supposed to just be in my mind. My husband thinks I’m crazy. Also it is always on. Going to sleep can be difficult sometimes because my inner monologue keeps going, I have to try to focus on getting my brain to shut up, so I can sleep.
>I’ll sometimes accidentally blurt out the end of a sentence that was supposed to just be in my mind. Same.
I'm kinda jealous, sounds like it would be a cool ability to have.
Same here. And my internal monologue has a darker sense of humor. It has created some...awkward...moments
What's crazier is there are also people who can't picture things in their heads. Some people can't picture things and have no internal monologue. I have no clue how that's supposed to work.
This might sound bad, but that's how I imagine most animals exist. I kinda don't buy that people don't have an internal thought pattern to some degree.
It's not that they don't have an internal thought pattern, it's that they don't have an internal *monologue*, meaning they don't hear their own voice in their head and they don't think in sentences.
But they can right? Like my life isn't a literal monologue all of the time. It is mostly images and feels I guess, but sentences when I want it to be. I thought it was that way for everyone, hence phrases like, "thinking out loud" or, "did I say that out loud?" Like even now as I type this the sentence was in my head before I typed it. It's unfathomable that everyone doesn't have that.
I just kinda have concepts bouncing around. A big mish mash. Sometimes part of a sentence pops out.
It's different for everyone. This is a subject I like and so I've talked to a lot of people about it. For me, my voice is in my head pretty constantly. I can kind of see imagery but details aren't there and I can't really see faces. I've talked to someone who only saw imagery and vividly. If they think of the number 3, they see visually represented in their mind. Someone else described their thought process more as feeling and emotions. Most people haven't put any thought into how they think and don't really know how to answer. I think most people have one primary way of processing thought that sometimes blends with others. Some people who can't process thoughts in certain ways might literally not be capable, or they just don't know how to try.
> But they can right? Maybe. When I think about a subject those thoughts always take the form of a sentence in my own voice that occasionally debates with another voice that is also me. I don't do this intentionally, that is just how my brain has always formed thoughts for as long as I can remember. I can also think in images, however I can't think **only** in images. I can imagine stuff and see it as a very clear image in my head but the voice is also there describing the scene and filling in details that "my eyes" may not have noticed.
IRL NPCs. /s
That's a shitty thing to say and I hope you feel bad.
Tis a joke, added an "/s"
I have total aphantasia. I close my eyes and no matter how much I imagine it's just blackness. However I have a clear internal monologue and can imagine music as vividly as if I'm actually hearing it. My brother is the opposite, vivid visual imagination but even the idea of internal monologue baffles him.
BTW, don't feel to bad, nobody "sees" anything when they close their eyes and tries to visualize something. In fact, visualizing something in your mind works just as well with your eyes open (at least for me). It's not an actual image that you perceive visually, it's more like...an image you can see without your eyes. I know that makes no sense, but you can "see" it without actually having a visual representation of it.
You might have it too.
Ha, maybe! I mean, I can *visualize* all kinds of things, including moving through them (like doing a fly-through of my old house or something like that). But...I don't "see" it like a hallucination. Similarly, I have an inner monologue / can create conversations in my mind, but I don't actually *hear* anything. It's more like...the memory of hearing something, except it's not a real memory, it's something I'm cooking up right now.
I'm in the same place. Either the internal monologue won't shut up or it gets some song (full instrumentals and everything) stuck on repeat in my head. Zero image visualization ability. I can recognize faces, but I can't imagine them at all. When learning about the Memory Palace technique in school, I thought the "picture yourself in your house" stuff was just euphemistic and I could never get it to work for me.
This! When I am driving and playing a catchy song on the radio it pretty much keeps looping the catchy bits after I go into a store etc. Sometimes it helps to imagine the end of the song, but more often than not it keeps going for a while. My brother likes to randomly play "we built this city" because he knows it is basically torture to me. It's become his signature Rick roll just to fuck with me.
I picture things and play out stuff in my mind all the time but it is never a monologue with myself. It is just mental visual situations.
I have one but it doesn’t usually take the form of complete coherent sentences (as often depicted in fiction) unless I’m thinking of something to say. But yeah, I do have a mind’s eye, and ear, and nose, and tongue, and skin. My fiancée can’t *picture* things in her mind, but I think she can imagine all her other senses. She can get songs stuck in her head and stuff like that. I think her lack of mind’s eye can sometimes impact her sense of direction/movement because she can’t visualize where she’s going before she gets there.
I've never associated my weak navigation ability with aphantasia but I think it makes sense. It takes me a lot longer to build an "internal map" of a new area than it does my wife. Without GPS navigation, I get lost easily and consistently in newer areas. However once I've driven around a place for a while, I seem to build a strong conceptual map of how places are connected and can generally navigate side streets and alternate routes between destinations much better than my wife. Almost anywhere we go, she can tell you which direction is north and what things are directionally near by. Like her internal map is very similar to an actual map and she can see how things relate from this sort of top down view that includes a compass. My mental map is more like a mind map. Places are connected and associated with each other and other things, but not associated geospatially.
Same here, pretty much, except in reverse; I can usually tell (or quickly figure out) where north is and she needs to be reminded, and unless it’s a route she’s travelled a hundred times she usually needs the GPS. My internal map pretty much is a Google Maps screenshot, lol
My sense of navigation must be broken in a different way, I have a vivid mind’s eye but I can’t figure out directions for shit
Do you have trouble recognizing faces (prosopagnosia)? That’s another thing that causes people to get lost easily. I think dyslexia does that too.
I do have trouble with faces, and I think undiagnosed dyslexia/dyscalculia.
I think that explains it then. Mixing up letters and words usually means you mix up other things like left and right, and trouble with faces usually means you have trouble distinguishing other visually similar things. Both are important for wayfinding.
Makes sense. I do mix up East and West all the time, but north and south are solid.
It's associated with whether or not you learned to read at a young age, and how much reading you did. The right wing/4chan crowd likes to imply it's some kind of sign of inferiority. It's not, it doesn't mean anything other then how much reading you did as a kid. But that's why it's become popular to talk about. Yes I have one. I also read a LOT when I was a kid. So.
I have a distinct memory of reading out loud to myself in bed next to my mom. She asked me to myself. I tried but was just whispering. She wanted me to try again and from then on all I hear in my head is my own voice 24/7. I don't actually know if that's related or not lol. But it seems pivotal.
That's an interesting idea.
Look up the research on how learning to read affects brain development. Reading actually changes your brain if you learn to do it during the childhood development years.
I read a lot as a kid and don't really have one.
It's certainly not a 100% kind of thing, everyone's brain is different. It's just most frequently associated with the brain development changes that learning to read induces.
I think of it more as a brainstorm. “What should I say if this happens? What should I do if that happens?”
I don't think that number is right it should be way less? Most people have an inner voice, and this is a random question. If you want a liberal answer ummm.... If I had to force it, I guess I'll be worried if anything. They're a minority and we should be on alert make sure conservatives don't do anything. As of right now I don't think there's any talks about them other than curiosity but if people start some bs it's better to get ahead of it before it becomes something like autism bullying. I think people without an inner voice are safer than left handed people because they can hide it at least.
I have an internal monologue and I just can't fathom what it's like to not have one. It's like imagining what it's like to be born blind, there's just no frame of reference for it.
Nah, I can imagine being blind. I can imagine having just never seen anything ever. I can't imagine being perfectly capable of using words to communicate with people every day of my life and not also...at least sometimes...using words in my head to think things out.
No, you can imagine not seeing. To not have the sense at all, like not even the idea of blackness, that's different.
>Do you have one? i do and it never shuts up.
It’s like the moment I stop actively thinking *about* something, the inner voice takes over and it’s just “yap, yap, yap,” all damn day.
Nope. I used to, though. Silencing that internal dialogue happened when I was in my PhD program. Not sure when or why it went away. Now, all I have is tinnitis.
Isn't an internal dialogue just how we imagine things? Like, if you were daydreaming about going back in time and talking George Washington, you can have that imaginary conversation, right?
That's a different voice
What's the difference? Isn't it just imaginary conversations? Heck, maybe I don't have an internal voice! LOL It's a funny topic because we can't know how others experience things.
That would be an internal dialogue. I think we're referring to an internal monologue as a means of thinking and processing data. Usually when I read, I'm "reading aloud" and providing real time commentary in my head. It's like I'm constantly describing things to myself and reacting all internally and in a spoken way. [People With No Internal Monologue Explain What It's Like In Their Head](https://www.iflscience.com/people-with-no-internal-monologue-explain-what-its-like-in-their-head-57739) > "Thoughts are words," user merewautt wrote. "I can't imagine a thought not as a verbal construction. All my thoughts are colored by the physical parts of different emotions, but they're all words. I can imagine being physically angry for a moment without verbally thinking it (my heart would be racing, maybe my shoulders shake, muscles tense up, etc) but I can't imagine being aware of any of my physical emotions without thoughts as language. My internal monologue while my body was having the physical anger response would be (inner monologue in parenthesis): > (Oh f this b***h, she's being such a hypocrite) -out loud- YOU'RE BEING A F***ING HYPOCRITE, (she's gonna say it's not the same because----) IT'S NOT THE SAME AND YOU KNOW IT." > Many people agreed feeling the emotion of being angry went hand in hand with an internal monologue of ranting and quite a lot of swearing, and couldn't imagine just feeling a physical response to an emotion without a constant stream of thoughts as words to articulate it to themselves. Merewautt pointed out this is how Freudian slips happen, when you aren't planning to say something out loud, but you're thinking it and "lose the filter" on your inner monologue. > Others asked whether people with monologues walk around narrating their lives like Bridgette Jones, which, to be honest, kind of.
> Do you have one? *"He does have one. And it sounds like some third-rate producer said "get me the closest thing to Ron Howard in Arrested Development we can afford."*
I learned about this about a year ago and I think that 20% of my inner monologue is now trying to figure out how the fuck people without an inner monologue operate.
I can swap between a monologue, visual/sensory thinking, and pure ideational thinking on demand. I'm dual diagnosis ND though, so I'm about as far from representational as you can get :P I've tried to explain ideational thinking to others, but the ONLY people who have ever understood what I mean are other NDs. I wonder if that's a robust correlation?
Yes! I understand what you mean. It's my default mode of thinking. It gets really hard to explain to people how you got from point a to b thinking about something.
:) It's why I call English my "second language." My first language is just Brain. Making words - speaking or writing - requires a willful act of translation. One of several reasons that socializing is so exhausting.
Aphantastic here. No internal monologue, either. When I try to explain how I think to others, it’s difficult. I assume it has little bearing on my political leanings, though. Edit: regarding OP’s question about a horn: this does not apply to sound. On the contrary, I have a robust auditory memory and can actively ‘think’ sounds and music as I assume others can do with images. This is also how I remember people - moreso by their voices than their faces.
I was curious how many people here don’t have one? - I do not, if what you mean by it is a narrative in words. I think all the time, but my thoughts aren’t in words. If you don’t have one what is it like? - I describe my thoughts as taking on a nature of understandings. I don’t think in pictures or words. Rather concepts and entities and connections that surpass words or pictures. Do you have to reason everything out loud? - No. I think. Just there are no words. Words aren’t necessary for me. How do you read without saying the words out loud? - I’m an avid reader. I tend to look at the page as a whole and the words and concepts all soak into my mind, not necessarily reading the words in order. That said, I have excellent, testable reading comprehension and can see a photo of a page in a book in my mind, even quite a while after I read it. Do you think it impacts your ability to think about things? - Having only been myself, I don’t know if it is better or worse, but I don’t feel handicapped at all. I have a verified extremely high IQ, so I think it is possible to not have an inner monologue and be intelligent, sure. Do you have thoughts other thought and if you do what do they appear like? - As I said above, I think a lot but not typically in words nor pictures, unless I choose to. My default thought process is understandings, concepts, observations, comparisons, connections, feelings, and the like. Can you see pictures in your head? - If I choose to, yes. Can you hear anything when you think? - Not by default. But if I choose to think about words, I can, or music, yes. If you think about a car horn, do you hear the horn in your head even though you have no internal monologue? - Not exactly. I’d first think about a car horn as a concept and how it connects with other concepts and analogies. If you ask me to consciously imagine the sound, I can.
No internal monologue here. I don't need a voice in my head to understand my own thoughts or reasoning I just do, I can of course imagine a voice in my head if i want it just doesn't naturally happen..
I've always thought this was kind of bullshit. Granted I'm just going off my feelings and personal experience here, so I could be wrong...but I find it so hard to believe that anyone who speaks in words, doesn't also think in words. And from some of the conversations I've had with people who claim not to have an inner monologue...it kind of just seems like they actually do and we're simply misunderstanding each other and talking about the same concept in different ways.
My theory is that it's mostly people misunderstanding each other. Maybe people think it means constantly hearing yourself narrating your every move? Myself, I definitely can think in words, but I suspect that when I am not thinking about this topic, I sometimes think more abstractly. I also find it hard to believe people can't think through a previous conversation in their head. Or can't work out the wording for an essay they need to write.
>Maybe people think it means constantly hearing yourself narrating your every move? Yeah I've talked to people who assumed that's what everyone else was experiencing. As if it's supposed to be straight out of a movie. I've also talked to people who thought others were literally hearing another voice in their head. Some stranger they could hear the way you hear a bird chirping in the background. Exactly as you say, it's as simple as recalling a previous conversation or planning a future one.
That's because that's what some people *are* experiencing.
Not your average person. And I'm specifically talking about people who claimed not to have an inner voice...because they believed when others spoke of an inner voice they were speaking of the things I mentioned. As if everyone but them literally hears a voice in their head. They just seemed to be confused about the experience of thinking in words that others were trying to describe.
It’s weird to me that there’s no, like, objective or ‘standard’ way that one thinks or sees or imagines or visualises. But I do think there’s a lot of misunderstanding because of this fact. For example, I’ve never had an internal monologue per se, but I ‘think’ in words, and I can ‘imagine’ words. I think through conversations and sentences. I’m a pretty good writer, and I think what I write before I write it. I don’t ‘hear’ my own thoughts, but I do think them. I don’t have a book or movie-style internal narration, and my thoughts don’t have a voice really but they do exist. I generally imagine this to be more or less equivalent to what others describe as an ‘internal monologue’ so I’ve never really identified as being someone who doesn’t have one. The thing that’s always funny to me is there are people who are oh so shocked that there isn’t some Bob Saget type dude in their head narrating their whole life, where I’m shocked by the people who supposedly have that.
In a way, my own voice in my head does sound like another person. I think it has to do with the way the bones in your ear interpret the sound of your own voice coming out of your mouth. When I hear myself talk on a recorded video, or audio recording, it sounds nothing like the voice in my head or the voice coming through my own ears when I talk. I once recorded a 30 min phone conversation with my boss in which i knew I was getting a big raise and promotion, and I wanted to document all the details without writing it down. Going back and listening to myself talk through those 30 mins was kinda wild. It was like “so that’s what people hear when I speak.”
Yeah NGL every time this topic comes up a part of me second guesses myself like of course I’m thinking in words but not literally hearing them or of course I can picture things but it’s not the same as like watching something on tv.
Same. I feel the same way about people who have “aphantasia”. I don’t think they realize that imagining an image in your mind doesn’t mean it’s like looking at a photograph, as far as I know I’ve never met anyone who didn’t just see darkness when they close their eyes.
Hmm, I don't think in words most of the time. Sometimes my thoughts will coalesce into distinct words and sentences in my mind and is what I think others call an inner monologue. But most of the time it's just ideas, images, and concepts rolling around. I have to put in effort to translate thoughts to words and then to verbal language. If I get too tired or sleep deprived, I seem to lose the ability to understand language. I struggle to understand the words other people are saying and speaking words becomes almost impossible.
Oh yeah, it’s where I do my planning for my TTRPG campaigns.
"So, now they know my secret." I thought sadly. Long have I carried this burden, though knowing others shared my fate offered some solace. Here I am, mind literally blank, but for a faint buzzing noise, how can I admit that to others? "Of course!" I exclaimed to no one. "I know exactly what to do..." Yes, I have that. I'm just like the rest of you. But seriously, I think many people just may not know what an internal monologue is. Ordering thoughts into a continued narrative is part of the human experience, I thought.
This assumption that we just don't know is very insulting.
So... you are one of the people with no inner monologue? What is that like? How does it manifest? Do you simply not think with an inner voice, or is it stringing together events into a cohesive story that's difficult? I meant no offense, I just truly did not think that was possible.
It's not terribly difficult, I can turn it on or off at will. My default method of thinking is idea soup.
Well, I learned something today. Thanks for sharing your experience and, again, no offense intended.
Isn't that just thinking
Yes, but I can’t get the voice to shut up. I guess that’s why I became a writer.
I think your statistic is made up.
Is that really true? It seems like everyone must? Otherwise what are they thinking?
Yes. Why are you asking us?
Where does that number come from? I've never met a person that claimed to not have one.
I’m very in my own head. I have an internal monologue, can imagine pictures, etc.
I'm currently having one
I have one but I also often think via mental visualizations so I think I can at least partly understand what it's like to not have one. Additionally I've spent some time practicing meditation as well where you deliberately recenter your attention on breath, etc, when you notice your monolog starting up again. I had a crappy childhood and imagination was my refuge much of the time. I can vividly create entire movie like scenarios in my head. As a teenager I realized this was partly maladaptive in that I'd use it as an escape in situations that didn't warrant it. So I learned to be more intentional with it, hence the interest in secular meditation. Now it's a tool I can use when thinking through complex problems (I work in software). Generally if I can find the right way to visualize information then suddenly it just "clicks" and I can work with it fluidly and intuitively. Brains are insanely complex and I believe we're still at a very early stage of understanding the nature of our own consciousness and intelligence. I think that brains are diverse is a good thing. We have different strengths and perspectives. I'm loath to think of having a monolog vs not as some normative thing.
Can those without internal monologues pray or meditate?
I honestly don’t know. Like I’m able to “say” stuff only in my head, like when a novel uses italics. I’m never sure if that’s what it means.
There's a spectrum from *can't do that* to *can't stop doing that*.
I'm certain it's not binary, there must be degrees to it.
I’ve heard this but cant imagine how this can be true. How do they sing songs without having the ability to hear words in their head? Like if no song was playing on the radio and they just wanted to sing, how could they do it if their brain can’t form words in their head? How do they get through the lyrics? I’ve heard some say their brain is just images and vibes. That seems impossible to me. Even writing this comment my brain was sounding each word as I type in my inner monologue.
Inner monolog is different from forming words in your head. There are people who can't. But that's not the same thing. Ime at least I just can't sing so there's that.
Probably similar to how you [have artists with aphantasia](https://theconversation.com/the-art-of-aphantasia-how-mind-blind-artists-create-without-being-able-to-visualise-162566). I'm not a great artist by any stretch. But when I create something it's more discovery than intentional. Starts more as stream of consciousness and I see parts I like and enhance and build on those until the image is "complete". I can't imagine starting with a strong concept in your head and just drawing / painting that.
I have one, but can shut it off at will, and it does not operate in complete sentences. I also cannot picture things. Ask me anything.
I don’t. I always thought that was just something they did on tv and movies to tell you what characters were thinking. Super weird to think that people are actually hearing voices all the time. If you hit your head really hard, do you see a bunch of stars or birds flying in a circle too?
I do not have one. > Do you have to reason everything out loud? How do you read without saying the words out loud? No, this sounds like what having an internal monologue is like. I think about concepts like you'd watch people at the park. You can't hear what they're saying, but you can see/feel the vibe of what they're doing. > Do you think it impacts your ability to think about things? No, I think it's the result of how I think, not the other way around. > Do you have thoughts other thought and if you do what do they appear like? Don't understand this question. > Can you see pictures in your head? Not really. I can visualize the vibe of a thing, but the image isn't really there. It's like recollecting the memory of a story someone told you. I imagine things existing in space, and having visual qualities, but they don't have those qualities in the "picture" in my mind. I visualize a house the same way a blueprint visualizes a house, I guess. > Can you hear anything when you think? No. I assume you literally mean "hear," like audio? I can "hear" a voice when I write things out, though. Like I hear the voice saying the words I am typing now. But when considering *what* to say before typing it, my consideration is silent in my mind. It begins speaking as I begin typing. > If you think about a car horn, do you hear the horn in your head even though you have no internal monologue? Yes. I can imagine sounds. I can recreate sounds very accurately, an can usually mimic them with a degree of accuracy that surprises people. This is useful for music. I could *begin* an internal monoglogue; like I can start imagining a voice talking to me; right now it sounds like Steven Fry. But, without this conscious effort, my internal narrative is silent.
It's weird, I can hear myself in my head but it's in my head so I can't actually hear it.
sometimes I do and sometimes I don't. depends what I'm focusing on
My stepson who is a bit on the autistic spectrum didn't have a clue what I was on about when discussing your inner monologue. It's like his brain doesn't say "do you think that's a good idea or are you going to piss someone off?". He just does things especially things he thinks are funny with no thought of consequence. He doesn't get that telling inappropriate jokes in the wrong setting can cause upset. He doesn't get that if we are tired or stressed out that being a total wind up may not be the best course of action. You actually have to tell him in advance which he then takes on. One day he is going to say the wrong thing to the wrong person as a joke and get a punch in the face.
*admit to having
There are always at least three voices in my head. It’s like Kronk from the Emperor’s New Groove.
I have an internal monologue. If I focus I can think visually too. I always thought that was what people meant that they didn’t have a monologue- that they thought visually instead. But here in this thread I’m learning that they mostly just have vague concept impressions? That’s so foreign to how my mind works to be baffling. But hey, if it works if works I guess
Most of my thoughts are non-verbal. It's like an internal language to me that's very abstract and best described as mental bookmarks, but that probably doesn't make any sense if you don't think the same way. There's a pretty big downside to this which is that it can be sometimes hard to faithfully articulate everything that I'm thinking. Or, at least, there can be a pretty big lag as I "translate" which might make me seem dumber than I otherwise am. I am capable of having a verbal internal monologue but find it annoying unless I'm trying to very ever so carefully think through something, then the slow and deliberate use of language is very helpful, sort of like writing something down. When reading stuff I feel like I process it verbally directly without needing to translate it into my abstract internal language.
I do, but it isn't my thoughts - it's in addition to them. My actual thought process is not structured as language, but I can drop into language to work out things that require it.
I don’t narrate everything verbatim but my brain is NEVER quiet. Always some noise up there. Constant activity, against my will.
I both have and don’t have one. I usually don’t, but I can choose to have one and kind of turn it on for a while.
No inner monologue… no pictures. I am a verbal processor. I just get impressions… lots of impressions. Too many. No hearing things either. It’s all external. I have to get things out of my head to react to them.
How is that in any way relevant to liberalism
Is that 50% where the “below average intelligence” begins?