When you are away from your close ones, one of the best medium to keep in touch is through texts. Have you even noticed that you can hear your friends’ voices while reading texts from them? It can be their casual sarcasm or their excitement, which almost feels like they’re speaking to you in person.
There was a study done by Hazal Senkoyuncu that supports the idea of hearing your friends while reading messages from them. She was a communication student from Trinity Western University. Let’s find out the reason behind this popular phenomenon!
Friends’ Voice While Reading Text
Here are some of the reasons why you can hear your best friend’s voice while reading their texts!
- Emotional Connection – When two people share a strong emotional bond, their brains become attuned to each other’s communication styles. This is extremely common among close-knit friends, family or even with someone you’re dating! Due to this, even in text form, we can instinctively recognise the sender’s mood, sarcasm, or excitement without explicit cues.
- Familiarity with Communication Style – When you are close friends, you develop unique texting habits over time. It can be sending a specific emoji, phrasing sentences a certain way, or even intentional typos. All these patterns help you “hear” the sender’s voice in your mind.
- Mental Simulation – Our brains are wired to simulate real-life interactions. When reading a message from a close friend, your mind automatically fills in the gaps. You will be able to imagine their tone, pitch, and even facial expressions. These factors combined make the text feel more like a spoken conversation.
- Shared Experiences – Friends with deep connections have a treasure chest full of wonderful, shared memories. These experiences create a mental framework that helps them predict how the other person would sound or react in different situations. This makes text messages feel all the more personal.
- Nonverbal Cues in Text – Texts lack vocal inflexions, but people use different creative ways to convey their tone. Capitalisation, punctuation, emojis, and even GIFs serve as substitutes for spoken emphasis. This allows close friends to interpret messages with greater accuracy!
If you are someone who can hear your friends’ voices in your head while reading messages, then you share a close bond!
