Have you ever stopped to wonder where the voice in our head comes from when reading or when you are perhaps formulating a plan or what you might need to say to someone? Well, some very clever scientists have studied this phenomenon, and although no conclusive answers have been discovered yet, there are a few theories.
One of these theories is that of inner speech. Inner speech, also known as verbal thinking, refers to the little silent voice you hear inside your head when thinking or reading and scientists have been trying to explain it for a very long time. It is that voice that is talking, but you can’t hear and is often described as a shorthand version of the real speech.
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Another theory scientists have proposed may be the answer is through the use of subvocalization. Subvocalization is another type of inner speech that is produced when reading and provides us with the sound of the word as it is read unconsciously. Through reading, the vocal cords, muscles and often lips are activated and in doing this movement, we hear what we normally would have if we were to say it out loud.
Again, these are only theories and have yet to be proven, but even fMRI brain scans show inner speech as activated within the brain, so both are quite plausible. And with scientists already making the connection between nerve bundles in the brain and inner speech it won’t be long before more is understood and the mind mystery finally solved.