How do you read?

[Igu Soni]

I subvocalise (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subvocal), which means that I read everything out in my head. As a result, I read it out in different voices, whichmeans that each piece I read literally has its unique voice.
How do you read, and does it ever seem that your style has peculiarities others' don't? I've never found anyone who's quite understood the voice thing without me explaining it to him/her.

[Refus de Sejour]

Neat topic Igu!

My reading technique changes depending on what I'm reading.

I usually read poetry sub-vocally, or even vocally if there's no one around to give me funny looks. Reading it "lexically" - that is, scanning the lines visually - usually results in the poem flashing past with zero impact.

I read most prose lexically though; subvocal (aka "phonetic") reading of such texts usually results, for me, in boredom. I will slow down and phonetically read dense or florid passages though - for the former, in order to understand them - for the latter, in order to appreciate the word-music.

[Refus de Sejour]

By the way, I think that Wikipedia entry on subvocalization doesn't tell the full story. While research certainly does suggest subvocalisation is a better reading method than speed-reading, it's not clear that it is superior to lexical reading.

I recommend Stanislas Dehaene's recent book "Reading in the Brain" for an understanding of how, neurological, we actually read, and how different techniques involve different brain processes.

[Sibyl]

I think I subvocalise sometimes, but most of the time I just read the words on the page accompanied by the pictures those words evoke in my imagination.

[Loki]

Ok, now I feel ignorant and stupid. Would someone explain what sub-vocalisation is? In a simple way, if possible.

[Igu Soni]

Ok, now I feel ignorant and stupid. Would someone explain what sub-vocalisation is? In a simple way, if possible.

I subvocalise (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subvocal), which means that I read everything out in my head.
I'm constitutionally unable to say it in a simpler way.

[lenz]

Ok, now I feel ignorant and stupid. Would someone explain what sub-vocalisation is? In a simple way, if possible.

I think what Igu Soni and Refus de Sejour mean by sub-vocalisation is like hearing your own voice (in your head) speaking the words as you read. This can involve changing voices for the different characters. I do this and find that, although it's a comfortable, natural habit, it distracts me from paying serious attention to the words because I'm listening to myself trying to get the voices right instead of "listening" to what the writer is saying. It also causes my mind to wander and lose track of the story. I have to consciously "turn off" the sub-vocalisation in order to think directly about the subject of the text, especially if I want to read more quickly and remember more correctly. Sub-v. is, for me, a lazy habit probably retained from childhood. It can, on the other hand, be exhausting if I'm reading a play or a novel with lots of dialogue because I feel I have to act all the parts!

[Igu Soni]

I think what Igu Soni and Refus de Sejour mean by sub-vocalisation is like hearing your own voice (in your head) speaking the words as you read.
Not my own voice. The voice of my projection of the narrator/character. For me, it comes naturally; if all the characters sound the same, that's a concrete bad thing about the book, unless the characters' differentiation is completely besides the point.

[lenz]

I just looked at the wiki entry and see that I'm in agreement with the speed-readers. If I relax my vocal muscles and concentrate my eyes on the page I can read much more quickly and with better memory - it's just not as much fun.

[Igu Soni]

I just looked at the wiki entry and see that I'm in agreement with the speed-readers. If I relax my vocal muscles and concentrate my eyes on the page I can read much more quickly and with better memory - it's just not as much fun.
Interesting. My vocal cords aren't even slightly tensed up by reading. It's all in my head. I'm hearing this as I'm typing it out. That's how I'm aware of flow too.
How do you stop subvocalising? I can't. How else do you read a word with abstract meaning, like 'interesting'.

[Refus de Sejour]

Two itty-bitty points:

Everyone subvocalises when they read, though most people do it subconsciously. If you attach electrodes to someone's throat and get them to read something silently, you'll detect very small muscle movements in rhythm with the text.

This kind of subvocalisation is however (I suspect) at a faster pace than would be comfortable reading out load.

At the other end of the spectrum, "speed reading" is not the same thing as lexical reading (scanning the text visually). For most people, lexical reading is just what they do naturally when they read. People usually need to train themselves to speed read, and it seems to involve skipping large sections of text - and significantly reduces comprehension and memory.

I suspect if you measured a speed reader's subvocalisations electronically, you'd observe very rapid, abbreviated throat movements in rhythm with their reading.

[saliotthomas]

As i am mostly listening audi books i try to keep my subvocalisation to a minimum.

[Refus de Sejour]

How do you stop subvocalising? I can't. How else do you read a word with abstract meaning, like 'interesting'.

Igu, when you think about it, your subvocalising the word "interesting" doesn't really help solve the mystery of how you (or anyone) understands an abstract word.

Person A looks at the letters "interesting" on a page and knows what they mean.

Person B looks at the letters, then imagines the sound of the word, then knows what it means.

How the hell does that work, in either case? Neither the black marks on the page nor the (imagined) sound contain within themselves the abstract concept "interesting."

It's worth quoting Dehaene in full here:


Whether our mind ever goes straight from the written word to its meaning without accessing pronunciation or whether it unconsciously transforms letters into sound and then sound into meaning has been the topic of considerable discussion. The organization of the mental pathways for reading fueled a debate that divided the psychological community for over thirty years. Some thought that the transformation from print to sound was essential - written language, they argued, is just a by-product of spoken language, and we therefore have to sound the words out, through a phonological route, before we have any hope of recovering their meaning. For others, however, phonological recoding was just a beginner's trait characteristic of younger readers. In more expert readers, reading efficiency was based on a direct lexical route straight from the letter string to its meaning.

Nowadays, a consensus has emerged: in adults, both reading routes exist, and both are simultaneously active. We all enjoy direct access to word meaning, which spares us from pronouncing words mentally before we can understand them. Nevertheless, even proficient readers continue to use the sounds of words, even if they are unaware of it. Not that we articulate words covertly - we do not move our lips, or even prepare an intention to do so. At a deeper level, however, information about the pronunciation of words is automatically retrieved. Both the lexical and phonological pathways operate in parallel and reinforce one another.Crazy stuff.

[lenz]

Igu asked:

How do you stop subvocalising?

As has been pointed out, I don't, but (this sounds like that movie Men Who Stare at Goats (?)) I just concentrate visually on the text and ignore the sounds as much as possible - making my eyes do most of the work. Like ignoring a conversation going on near you. I can't do it for very long - but I find it useful for complicated sentences.

[Loki]

Well, now that I have understood (I hope) I've realised that's something I do as well. I didn't understand because it's so natural to me: it seemed impossible that it was justthat.
Anyway, I always sub-vocalise, although as some of you have said is something you do subconsciously most of the time.

[Omo]

Interesting thread. When I read a text for pleasure I always sub-vocalise, often even consciously. When I read texts that employ sound and flow to enrich (literary prose) or form (poetry) meaning I read out loud in order to support my visual comprehension.
If I read a text for information I scan it "lexically" as Refus calls it, and as lenz describes such:


[...]I just concentrate visually on the text and ignore the sounds as much as possible - making my eyes do most of the work.

-


Not my own voice. The voice of my projection of the narrator/character. For me, it comes naturally; if all the characters sound the same, that's a concrete bad thing about the book, unless the characters' differentiation is completely besides the point.

This sounds like a kind of synaesthetic comprehension to me. Most people of more complex intellect experience this in one form or the other.

[Igu Soni]

This sounds like a kind of synaesthetic comprehension to me. Most people of more complex intellect experience this in one form or the other.
Interesting idea about it being synaesthetic, Omo. I never thought about it that way, one of the reasons being that it's basically imagining the whole thing. Though, now that I come to think of it, I even think in in-head-talking. Really interesting, and will probably take a few days for me to digest it fully and actually understand its implications.

Can you, however, explain what you mean by 'people of more complex intellect'? I know you mean something more than meets the eye (or, in my case, hits the neural ear).

[Bottle Rocket]

I always understood sub-vocalization as a muted version of actually moving your lips and "sounding out" the words, just not aloud.

When I got to college they did some sort of reading-speed test, and told me I should take a speed-reading course, which irritated me since I had always placed out of reading requirements and was well ahead of grade level.

The way they "cured" sub-vocalization was to have you chew gum while you read, which short-circuited the actual physical movements involved in sub-vocalizing. I don't know whether it was the gum or something else, but my capacity to read a great deal faster was certainly enhanced. Thorough, integrated comprehension suffered, but as a way to absorb the gist of a passage (so as to go back later and focus on the key parts) it was pretty effective. It stood me in good stead when I read professionally as a reader/editor in a publishing house, but it's entirely unsuited for pleasure reading or close appreciations.


:) BRocket :)

[peter_d]

I certainly sub-vocalize. The more distracting stimuli I have around me, the ?louder? I sub-vocalize.

[Omo]

[...]Can you, however, explain what you mean by 'people of more complex intellect'? I know you mean something more than meets the eye (or, in my case, hits the neural ear).

First I wanted to write "higher intelligence", but then I thought that higher implies linear progress, whereas intellect is a growing process, like a tree - the more it grows the further its branches reach, the more branches there are (analogue: roots), the better its wood etc., and this I covered by the word complex; intellect instead of intelligence was employed to support this thought: we need many intelligences to form intellect - intelligence can be high or low, intellect only more or less complex. Sorry, I tend to write too elliptic.

[miercuri]

I certainly sub-vocalize. The more distracting stimuli I have around me, the ?louder? I sub-vocalize.
Same with me, but I have noticed that when I'm reading something that is really gripping and keeps me turning the pages my sub-vocalization is 'turned off'. Otherwise I don't think I can help sub-vocalizing voluntarily.