How do you hear your reading?

[SaveUs3rname]

So, when I read, I literally hear myself reading in my head. I put on different character voices etc.

DH has told me that when he reads, he hears nothing?! He doesn't like reading (don't blame him if he hears nothing).

What about everyone else?!

I read quickly too, and I just read, rather than 'hear' the words.

It is, however, vital for me to have a visual image of the characters. If I don't decide who's who, the book doesn't resonate properly.

I read quickly. I could easily read a book a day. I wouldn’t say I hear myself reading. But I visualise everything - it’s like a film set playing out in my head - I picture everything.

Me too.

I wonder if people who hear the words in their head when they read get on with audiobooks better than those who don't.

I see chunks of words and take in the meaning, and don't always read totally sequentially, so when I listen to an audiobook it's frustratingly slow, and also frustratingly sequential — I can't just flick my eyes back up to a previous paragraph to remind myself of something. But then, maybe people who hear the words when they read don't need to flick their eyes back to check things because they're taking it all in properly at a steady, speaking pace.

I also wonder if people who hear the words when they read have more difficulty with spelling of homophones — if you process the words auditorily when you read them, do "their", "there" and "they're" register as strongly as different words as they do for people who process those words visually?

I think there are probably quite a lot of punny jokes and other aspects of literature that people who mentally hear what they read are able to appreciate and get more benefit from than those of us who don't hear the words.

People saying you must be a slow reader if you hear your voice in your head when reading, I don't think that's the case. I hear my voice but I'm a fast reader. I think I get into a flow state where I'm doing the absorbing some of you talk about but it still has the flavour of my voice reading the words

I also see images, and have other sensory experience when reading so I think it's a full experience for me

I say them but don't think I hear them?

This is such an interesting thread. I read at lightening speed but noticed when I was reading all the replies I heard them in my own voice at normal speed but OPs posts I would hear in a different voice. I'm going to try and pay attention next time I pick up a book! Never really thought of this, I do visualise whatever I read though vividly.

I hear the words in my head but I was not aware of it until thinking about it in response to your question.

I don't hear different accents for characters in books.

Another here who has a visual response, much like watching a movie. If a book is very good I am often completely oblivious to the words. Pictures just form in my head as my eyes scan the words.

I find reading out loud difficult as my eyes move too fast so I lose where I am on the page repeatedly. I also hate audio books - way too slow!!

I hate watching movie adaptations of books because it is so different, I was once so sure about something being wrong in a movie adaptation that I got the book out only to find it wasn't mentioned at all in the book. My imagination had filled in the detail so vividly that I was sure it must have been specicified.

I sometimes struggle to appreciate poetry, some poetry is very visual and I can enjoy it, but some isn't and I feel blocked by the words.

Like with poetry, My mum often comments on the beautiful way something is written or a clever choice of words when she lends me a book but I never see these things which I feel bit sad about.

Non fiction, I skim for gist so that I understand the sense of what I am reading.

I also visualise the scene - I have been reading Penelope Lively's The Road to Lichfield and I am there at the bedside in the father's posh Care Home or rattling along the road to Lichfield (cars could be pretty rattly then).
I suspect I get mildly irritated if the book doesnt' flow and I'm taken from pillar to post (eg when books jump to the past).

Also hear fiction like an audiobook.
If it's something I might have watched then sometimes the characters have those voices.
I can't read Bernard Cornwall's Sharpe series because Sean Beans voice doesn't'fit' for me and I just can't concentrate.
Non fiction it depends, sometimes it's a bit like Richard Attenborough or Mary Beard, sometimes it's my own voice. Bills etc don't have a voice iykwim.
This is really interesting op.
I love reading. My dh doesn't.
4 out of my 6 dc love it. 2 loathe it. I wonder if it's why? I honestly have never considered it before.
As a primary teacher it's interesting too.

Same here.

This is SUCH an interesting thread, I’ve tried to talk to people about how they see/hear/think words before and they just appear to think I’m odd!

i read super quickly and don’t necessarily hear my voice, or more like I hear my voice but it doesn’t sound like my voice when I actually do hear my voice. Like many posters this is at normal speaking speed but I’m reading twice the speed. I also hear/see what I’m reading like a film.

The thing that others find weird is that when I speak I see the words floating around in my head, especially superlatives, it’s like I have a thesaurus in there, and then pluck the word I want down and slot it into the sentence I’m saying - does anyone else do this?

I'm a relatively slow reader and I definitely hear a voice when reading, although I also get quite strong visual images (and cast a young Jeremy Irons as the male lead wherever plausible). I'm a very verbal person who is fascinated by words, and I can get very annoyed by some fiction on stylistic grounds.

I am also a strong proofreader and can read for spelling/grammar without necessarily taking in the sense - I'm sort of reviewing it in a structural way. I also find that often when reading aloud I produce all the right words but don't take in the meaning, which seems related. My daughter has ASD and I increasingly suspect I'm on or near the spectrum too, which might link to this?

l'm a fast reader but I still hear my own voice, if I read out loud it frustrates me that I have to slow down so much. No problems with homophones either, to me they are completely obvious, eg there/their etc, my DC/DH are dyslexic/dyspraxic, slow readers and do struggle with them.

I'm not so good at audio books, my mind tends to wander, I mainly listen to memoirs as there aren't as many threads to follow as a typical novel. I'm also not great at following films and plays compared to books. Dyslexic DD can follow incredibly complicated (to my mind) films.

When I read I hear the words in my head like I'm thinking them obviously the same voice as my inner voice that tells me to put the washing on or whatever.
When I'm reading though I do hear the characters as other voices, male/female northern or whatever. Well I think I do ,like Claire in Outlander she's very female and posh and Jamie is male and Scottish.
So Claire would be heard differently to say Hermionie from HP she's a different voice.

I have very strong visuals (hyperphantasic), and I also hear voices as I read. It doesn't slow my reading speed, though. I have been working my way through Joyce's Ulysses, and I was reading it yesterday while on a train - and realised the voice in my head had a Irish accent, which I hadn't previously been aware of (and not just when people were speaking - they take on their own voices.) This is not totally a surprise, as I'm reading it partly because of an Irish colleague on whom i am very keen, but the voice is my head is more like a different colleague's - and he is a Dubliner, unlike the first one.

Until yesterday, I'd have said the descriptive bits were just my own voice, but now I don't know. Characters' speech has always taken on the voice of the character (which hasn't always matched what it should be, if I know they're American or Welsh or something, it doesn't necessarily take on that accent in my head.) But I was less aware of plain prose doing so.

I listen to a lot of Radio 4, so I expect there's some influence from those voices I hear all the time. It's not something I'm fully aware of, though there is always a voice.

I can't imagine hearing a voice reading the words! Wow. Fascinating. Before print times lots of people would have read texts out loud, even to themselves, so it's more authentic really.

I hear the words, and I hear the dialogue in different voices, whilst seeing the pictures like a film.

I read very fast (about 50% faster than average according to Kindle - a 4 hour book will generally come down to about 2.5 hours) - this is much faster than I could speak, but still hear it as a voice. How strange to think these might be mutually exclusive.

I often but not always see a little scene like in a film. It's why adaptations are usually disappointing as nothing is as I imagined it!

I love reading and see a whole film in my head. My son is autistic and has never enjoyed reading - he doesn't see anything in his mind when he reads. its just words on a page to him.

Basically, this. A good book, when I think back in it, it's hard to remember if it was a book or a movie because the visuals are so clear to me and characters talk their words in my head and I read the rest in my head and "hear" it.

Posters like @Aramox , is it generally quiet inside your head?

I can't do audio books, my brain wanders and I'm the total opposite to this I also find that often when reading aloud I produce all the right words but don't take in the meaning, if I read inside its easy to read and not absorb. If I'm proofing or it's important I at least have to mumble it out loud to make sure I get it

I don't hear anything, the information just gets absorbed.

I've got Aphantasia though so can't picture things in my mind, so while my partner says she has a film going on in her head when she reads, there's nothing like that for me.

I can hear songs etc, in my head though, so it's not that I can't do dialogue, I suppose that without the pictures my brain just can't be arsed acting out the words.

I hear words, different voices for different characters, I can also picture the settings and characters in my head like a film.