Verbal thinking

For me, yes (except embedded sponsor bits that are actually part of the run-time of the actual video itself.)

Does using duckduckgo get rid of YouTube adverts!??

Haha, this happened to me yesterday. A very articulate morning (and the office was full of additional winding-down-for-Christmas banter) but by lunchtime I could barely string two coherent words together, had been too much of a runaway train, and just needed the world to stop. 

I suppose what I mean is that for a more NT mind it seems to function like scan reading (also something I just can't do) - whole sentences assimilated instantly and translated into something more like symbolic shorthand. Whereas I'm trapped in the land of verbal assesment of what's already words, so its a commentary track over a premiere so to speak, and I can either zone out or focus to the best of my ability, while the 90% of me that is just screamingly self-consious about even being eye-contacted with etc, is really at the wheel anyway. 

My ability to articulate is pretty good but it can unravel if I’m very tired, and there are some thoughts and sensations that I simply cannot put into English.

Hi Shardovan, you make some interesting points there.

Firstly, about being primarily verbal and buffering. If you are primarily verbal, wouldn’t you be faster at it?

I get the buffering point though. When people are talking to me I spool off some asynchronous threads that process what they’re saying. Sometimes the results come back in the wrong order, too late or get lost altogether! I also unpack over hours and days afterwards.

Re your “we” - I have often felt like there are two agents in my head and wonder if these are the unconscious source of my thoughts and the conscious part of me looking at them as they arise.

Funnily enough, this is actually what my driving instructor told me to do. I was struggling so much with not being overwhelmed by all the input and decision making that he said, it might be beneficial to put into words what seems like an abstract construct in my head. 
It kind of works. Well, after a bit of practicing.

I'm definitely a primarily verbal thinker - which is partly why I think I lag behind with processing in terms of processing conversations with NTs who seem to instantly convert my side of the conversation into a 'got that - next?' moment, whereas I'm trailing behind with a buffering element making me lose whole 'data packets' or whatever the appropriate term would be. Anyway, I do like being the way I am - I think it give me, with time, space, and solitude to do it, the opportunity and innate tendancy to think deeply, fully, comprehensively about things others might gloss over. Or unpack and postmortem in ways most don't, over hours, days, weeks, returning to and refining thinking around matters both weighty and (on the surface) frivolous. Because it's kind of real-time verbal thinking, I'm slow but thorough. And it explains why I was very good at essays at school but atrocious in exams. That 'atomic' thinking you mention, A, is something I think that I occasionally glimpse 'under the hood' as it were, but it's there as the inceptual seed of the next bit of real-time inner monologuing or, sometimes, dialguing - and argument with myself. Which may explain the 'we' that creeps into my default 'what now' moments of thinking aloud. 'OK, what are we doing now?' I've asked other people occasionally if they have that 'we' thing when formulating a mental to do list and articulating it so the brain processes what's ahead... and not one person has yet said they do. Maybe they think I'm trying to be a bit Royal! :-)

I have a pervasive internal monologue. I think in words, usually arranged in structured sentences. Perhaps this is because my visual memory is quite like an impressionist painting. I get an overall impression of remembered objects, while individual details can be sharp, they tend to slip in and out of focus. Probably why I cannot do mental arithmetic.

It’s quite an interesting concept and discussion - I know that advanced police driver training programs and some train driver programs encourage drivers to think out loud and verbalise their next actions while driving and I’ve even heard something about trainee pilots being encouraged to do this as well, as a training aid 

It’s kind of weird with me. I can discuss things with myself for hours and during those discussions I pretty much feel like, there is someone narrating. I once went on a 2.5 hour walk with my dog and after approximately 1.5 hours I realised that I didn’t put my headphones on although I left with the intention of listening to a podcast. So yes, it can be quite noisy, especially when getting stuck on words (for multiple reasons e.g. liking the sound of them, not understanding them, being anxious about them). 
But other times, especially when I think about more complex matters, I think in abstract concepts. There were many occasion when I tried to put something in words (e.g. during a lesson or a conversation with a friend) and all that came out was gibberish. I improved my ability to articulate myself over the years, but I still struggle a lot with that. It sometimes makes me feel like being stuck in my own head.

My brain is constantly on monologue mode, and I find it fascinating that some people don't experience the same. 

I don't think in words either, it's all complete scenes full of sounds, smell's and vision, ideas come not fully formed but as they form the emerge more clearly. It's like seeing someone you think you recognise in the distance but aren't really sure until they get closer.

I quite often have more than one "voice" talking at the same time, like different parts of my brain talking to each other.

My head is often a very busy place and if I seem distracted some of the time, it's because I'm paying attention to my internal world.

Technical training videos (in my technical sphere) I will also consume at 1+ speeds/FF bits......because they are easy for me to follow normally.....but much of what I want to listen to out of interest, is dense / complex / deep-thought stuff, so I need to absorb it more slowly....I need to partially digest it, before my brain seems willing or able to store some of it.

That’s interesting. I watch a lot of technical training videos because of my work and always watch at 1.5x or 1.75x. I listen to audiobooks at 1.5x too.

I’m not very patient.

I very often listen to dense, fast or overwhelming YouTube videos at 0.8 speed as out_of_step suggests.  I only ever watch YouTube in Duckduckgo (because u cannot abide adverts) and the speed option is available in that browser platform.

Unknown said:

my aural processing is quite poor

He speaks quite fast. I find this a problem with some youtube videos. If you watch the clip in actual youtube (that being on a browser or app, rather than an embedded thumbnail as above), you can click on the settings wheel (top right of the video screen ususlly) and select "Speed". You can change it. I find around 0.75-0.8 still sounds a natural enough pace without it being r e a l l y     r e  a  l  l  y       s      l      o    w.

I've yet to find a description of 'internal monologue' that I can definitely say does or doesn't apply to me.

Deleted User said:

what I’m now wondering is if everyone’s brain works this way but my neurodivergence just makes me aware of an earlier stage of thinking that most people don’t notice

It is quite possible to change the way we think, but it takes some training and discipline.

I discovered the limitations of this verbal thinking when I was sent on a speed reading training course where you read the page of a book in a few seconds. There is no way to do this by reading it word by word using our old ways of processing and you have to relax and let your eyes scan and your brain process in the background.

The process is incredibly effective with around 80% of the information absorbed in less than a 10th of the time of conventional reading.

I was able to use this same technique in other sorts of mental processing and shut off the old ways of working through things slowly so I could analise fairly complex problems and come up with the nucleus of a solution very fast - a real advantage in competetive environments.

The drawback is that you are still missing 20% of the info so it is only effective when you can work in a "lossy" situation where you just need to get the bigger picture and not fine detail. For the detail you still need to go slowly.

I suffered bad headaches for the first few days of speed reading until my brain could adjust to the continuous flow of information for long periods.

For pleasure reading I always go slowly and savour the prose of a good author for example, but if I was just reading the background of a new topic to get loosely up to speed on it then it works fine.

The same goes for problem solving - it is great for getting closer to possible solutions but you need the detail to be covered to see if it has any flaws or will cause side effects.

Being able to shift gears like this is also great in dangerous situaions where you need to assess risks fast.

In essence, your limits are only what you let them be most of the time. Other ways of thinking are possible with the right training but they are rarely easy.

This is very interesting.

I believe I do both but I've now become so self conscious of my thoughts that I don't think I'm thinking naturally!

I couldn't watch much of the video - my aural processing is quite poor.

Deleted User said:

And what I’m now wondering is if everyone’s brain works this way but my neurodivergence just makes me aware of an earlier stage of thinking that most people don’t notice. I’m aware of a part of thinking that in most people is part of the unconscious

Food for thought.

Thank you for getting the cogs of my very tired brain moving again.