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Some people don’t have a voice in their head, and a new study suggests they have memory issues
Did you know that some people don’t have a voice inside their head? A portion of the population hears nothing – and it could have consequences.
A new study has found that people who don’t have an inner voice could have issues when trying to remember things.
Inner voice and memory issues
Researchers from the University of Copenhagen and the University of Wisconsin-Madison analysed people who reported that they either experienced a high degree of inner voice or very little inner voice in everyday life.
They tested their memory, asking them to remember words that are similar phonetically or in spelling, like bought , caught , taut and wart and found the people with no inner monologue found it much harder to remember them.
The people with the inner voice were able to repeat the words to themselves inside their head in order to remember them, but participants without a voice inside their head didn’t have that same benefit.
A similar result was found when the participants were asked to determine whether a pair of pictures contained words that rhyme. For example, pictures of a sock and a clock. Again, repeating the words inside your head is crucial in being able to determine if they rhyme.
At the moment, there isn’t a name for this lack of inner voice, but the researchers proposed “anendophasia,” which is similar to�aphantasia, the inability to form mental images, and synesthesia when your brain routes sensory information through unrelated senses.
How people with no inner voice think
The idea that some people don’t have a voice inside their head is a difficult concept to grasp for people who do. How do they think?
As explained by Verywell Health, there are many different ways of thinking, and inner speech is just one of them. Others use “inner seeing,” which is imagining an imagine in your mind that doesn’t match what you’re seeing in reality.
Another way is through “unsymbolized thinking,” which is thinking without using words, images or symbols at all. For example, you know how to brush your teeth without thinking about it first.
“Feeling” is another form of thinking, involving consciously considering your emotions, like feeling happy after getting good news. Finally, others think with “sensory awareness,” using the senses to impact their thoughts. For example, feeling your clothes blowing on a windy day.
Some people can think in all five of these ways, while others may be limited to just one or two. However, more research is needed into the subject to determine why people think in different ways, and the effects on a person’s life.
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