What we say to ourselves, when we say [it], and how, has a tremendous impact on our self-esteem, beliefs about self-efficacy, and overall sense of worth. This may all seem very obvious, and yet negative self-talk spoken or thought still happens regularly. Use self-talk to your advantage: Cheering yourself on before an important event or talking to yourself while completing a task are two great opportunities for self-talk.
In fact, a small study published in the Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology found that when looking for familiar items like those keys , speaking to themselves and saying the name of the item out loud helped people find the objects more quickly.
You can also use self-talk to work through extreme emotions — including anger, sadness, confusion and stress — and to sort out personal conundrums.
Don Vaughn , a neuroscientist who studies human behavior. While you might sometimes simply narrate what's happening in a more stream-of-consciousness manner without really paying attention to the content of your words, listening and thinking about your self-talk can be a helpful way to gain greater self-awareness. Instead of talking to yourself in the first person, try switching to a second or even third-person perspective. In one study, researchers found that when people talked to themselves in the third person, they were able to better regulate their own emotions.
This can be particularly helpful if you are dealing with difficult or stressful feelings. Using the third person can help give you some distance from those feelings, which can help you evaluate them more objectively, almost as if you were observing someone else's thoughts rather than your own.
How you talk to yourself can have an important impact on your self-esteem , learning, and self-awareness. Treating yourself with kindness, asking yourself questions, and paying attention to your words can help you make the most of your self-talk. There's usually nothing wrong with talking to yourself, but that doesn't mean that there might not be times when you want to keep your thoughts to yourself instead of verbalizing them. For example, others might find your self-talk disruptive, particularly if you are sharing a workspace with other people.
So what can you do to manage your tendency to talk to yourself? Some strategies that can help include:. Self-talk isn't always a positive force. If you are engaging in negative self-talk, it can take a toll on your confidence, self-esteem, and mental well-being. Sometimes you might find yourself engaging in self-talk centered on rumination , or continuously talking about the same sad, negative, dark thoughts. This type of self-talk may be a sign of a mental health condition such as depression.
Self-talk can also be a concern if it occurs as a result of hallucinations. In this case, a person would talk aloud to a non-existent external source rather than engaging in a conversation with themselves.
Hallucinations may be connected to a number of different conditions including schizophrenia , bipolar disorder , substance use, metabolic conditions, and post-traumatic stress disorder PTSD. Self-talk that is illogical, incoherent, and accompanied by disordered thoughts can be a sign of schizophrenia or a related condition.
In most cases, talking to yourself isn't a sign of an underlying mental health problem. However, if this self-talk is extremely negative, difficult to control, or accompanied by auditory or visual hallucinations, you should talk to your doctor.
A doctor or therapist can help determine if you might have a mental health condition and recommend appropriate treatments. They can also help you learn to manage the behavior and avoid negative self-talk.
While talking to yourself is sometimes viewed as eccentric, quirky, or even pathological, it is important to remember that it is actually incredibly common. Not only that, it can have a number of important benefits including regulating emotions and improving memory. So go ahead and talk to yourself when you're walking down the aisles of the grocery store or preparing yourself to give a big speech. While it might seem silly, it actually works.
Everything feels more challenging when you're dealing with depression. Get our free guide when you sign up for our newsletter. Brinthaupt TM. Individual differences in self-talk frequency: social isolation and cognitive disruption. Front Psychol. Geurts B. Making sense of self talk. Rev Philos Psychol. Researchers have been studying self-talk for a long time. In the s , scientists were particularly interested in what people say to themselves, why they talk to themselves, and the purposes of self-talk.
Research defines self-talk as a verbal expression of an internal position or belief, meaning it expresses inner feelings, non-verbal thoughts, and intuitions about a situation through speech. The person only intends to direct their speech at themselves. While children often talk to themselves, it should not be a cause for concern for parents or caregivers. It is a way of developing language, staying stimulated during a task, and improving performance while completing tasks.
Self-talk may have several benefits. It causes no significant health risks unless a person also experiences other symptoms of a mental health condition, such as hallucinations.
While performing a task with a set of instructions, self-talk may improve control over the task, concentration, and performance. It may also enhance problem-solving skills. A study examined how self-talk affects visual search tasks. The findings suggest that self-talk while looking for a particular object, such as a lost item of clothing or set of keys, or trying to find products in a grocery store, may help a person find them sooner.
Research also suggests there could be benefits to engaging in self-talk during sport, depending on how the person self-talks and what they say. For example, self-talking in a motivational or instructional way could improve performance. However, although negative self-talk may increase motivation in sport, it may not improve performance.
There are three categories of self-talk that differ depending on the tone of voice. These include:. People may also refer to talking to yourself as overt and covert self-talk. Overt talk is self-directed speech that other people can hear. Covert talk is speech that occurs internally that no-one else can hear, for example, by mouthing speech rather than speaking out loud. All rights reserved. Is talking to yourself a sign of mental illness?
Talking to yourself can have benefits. Talk yourself through everyday problems. Is talking to yourself ever harmful? Suggest a correction. Now What? So Long, Hyaluronic Acid. Newsletter Sign Up.
0コメント