The Theory

When you talk to yourself in your head — that silent voice narrating your thoughts, arguing both sides of a decision, rehearsing what you will say — that is what psychologists call inner speech. It evolved from the way children talk out loud while playing (Vygotsky noticed this decades ago) and gradually moved inward. But here is the twist: not everyone has it. Some people think without any words at all, in what researchers call unsymbolized thinking. Your inner monologue is not a universal feature of being human — it is one cognitive channel among several.

What the Research Found

Fernyhough showed that inner speech is condensed and fragmented, not full sentences — more like shorthand your brain uses with itself. Morin and Michaud found that self-talk activates Broca's area and superior temporal cortex, the same regions involved in producing and hearing actual speech. Kahneman's System 2 (deliberate, slow thinking) turns out to be predominantly verbal. Meanwhile, Hurlburt documented people who genuinely think without words, images, or any sensory form — pure unsymbolized thought — proving that the verbal channel is a preference, not a requirement.

How We Use It

In our questionnaire, question A1 asks what happens inside your head when tackling a complex concept. Option (a) — "I talk to myself internally: I build sentences, argue with myself, silently raise objections" — maps directly to inner speech research (dimension value 1.1). Questions A2 through A5 also include option (a) variants that capture verbal-internal processing. If you consistently pick these options, your dominant cognitive channel is verbal-internal, which means your thinking relies heavily on the linguistic machinery Fernyhough and Morin describe.

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References (4)

  1. Fernyhough, C. (2016). The Voices Within: The History and Science of How We Talk to Ourselves.
  2. Morin, A. & Michaud, J. (2007). Self-awareness and the left inferior frontal gyrus: Inner speech use during self-related processing. DOI
  3. Kahneman, D. (2011). Thinking, Fast and Slow.
  4. Hurlburt, R. T. (2011). Investigating Pristine Inner Experience: Moments of Truth. DOI