People tend to use first-person self-talk far more often than distanced self-talk, but when they take a step back and address themselves by name, it can subtly improve how they feel, particularly in moments of preparation or anticipation.
Study: The frequency, form, and function of self-talk in everyday life. Image Credit: Hitdelight / Shutterstock
In a recent article in the journal Scientific Reports, researchers examined self-talk in everyday life. They investigated how people’s self-talk shifted in different situations and looked at its links to narcissism or emotional distress.
They found that people were more likely to engage in ‘immersed’ self-talk, speaking to themselves in the first person, rather than more distanced self-talk. Distanced self-talk yielded a small but reliable increase in positive affect only in situations that required preparation for action or speech. Interestingly, self-talk was least frequent in these preparatory situations, despite being the only context in which it improved mood.
Psychological Functions of Self-Talk
Talking to oneself is a common human behavior that serves various self-regulatory functions. Past lab studies have shown that distanced self-talk, referring to oneself by name or in the third person, helps manage emotions and align behavior with goals by promoting psychological distance.
Gaps in Understanding Everyday Use
However, little is known about how often people spontaneously use this form of self-talk in everyday life, when they do so, and how it affects emotions outside laboratory settings. Earlier theories viewed self-talk as a developmental tool for self-regulation, and later research confirmed that self-talk often arises in challenging, emotionally charged, or performance-based situations.
Yet most studies have not distinguished between distanced and immersed self-talk. Evidence suggests that adopting a distanced perspective may enhance problem-solving, emotional control, and goal pursuit.
Personality Traits Influencing Self-Talk Styles
Individual differences, such as emotional distress and narcissism, may influence how often people use these perspectives. Distressed individuals might rely more on distanced self-talk as a coping mechanism, while narcissists might use it to reinforce self-importance.
Real-Time Tracking of Self-Talk Patterns
Researchers explored when and how people naturally use distanced (‘you’ or the person’s name) and immersed (‘I’) patterns in everyday life. They employed an ecological momentary assessment (EMA) design over a two-week period.
A total of 208 participants completed three phases. In the first phase, participants filled out baseline questionnaires on emotional distress and narcissism and received training to distinguish between immersed and distanced self-talk. The sample was predominantly undergraduate students in the United States, and age data were not recorded due to a survey oversight. Data collection took place from 2017 to 2018.
During the second phase, participants received five text messages per day for 14 days, each containing a brief survey. In each survey, they reported whether they had recently experienced one or more of four types of situations: feeling self-critical, trying to feel better, preparing for what to say or do, and feeling pleased with themselves.
For each situation, they indicated whether they had engaged in immersed self-talk, distanced self-talk, or no self-talk at all. Participants could select more than one option. Primary analyses excluded episodes where participants reported both immersed and distanced self-talk for the same situation; exploratory contrasts versus no self-talk were presented in supplementary analyses. A small proportion of participants (2%) never used immersed self-talk, while two participants reported using neither form of self-talk.
In the third phase, participants were debriefed and compensated. The EMA approach allowed researchers to capture real-time, context-dependent use of self-talk and assess its relationship to momentary affect (emotional state), trait emotional distress, and narcissism across multiple naturalistic settings.
Frequency, Stability, and Emotional Outcomes
Across the 12,966 surveys, participants reported 20,646 relevant situations. They used immersed self-talk 43.2% of the time, distanced self-talk 14.5% of the time, and reported no self-talk 42.3% of the time. Immersed self-talk was significantly more common across all situations.
The most frequent contexts for distanced self-talk were self-critical and situations aimed at feeling better. In contrast, preparatory situations showed the lowest frequency of distanced self-talk (approximately 16%), despite being the context where it provided the most emotional benefits. While 18% of participants never used distanced self-talk, almost all engaged in immersed self-talk at least once.
Individuals generally showed consistent (stable) use of distanced self-talk over time, whereas immersed self-talk fluctuated more. Daily variability was lower for distanced than for immersed self-talk across situations, indicating greater trait-like stability. Specifically, the mean within-person standard deviation was smaller for distanced self-talk (SD = 0.13) compared with immersed self-talk (SD = 0.21), reinforcing its stability.
Distanced self-talk was most stable in preparatory and pleased situations. When analyzing affect over time, in time-lagged models that adjusted for prior affect, distanced versus immersed self-talk predicted a slight increase in positive affect (d ≈ 0.09) only in preparatory situations, but not in self-critical, feel-better, or pleased contexts.
There were no significant associations between self-talk type and trait emotional distress or narcissism, and neither trait moderated the emotional outcomes of self-talk. Overall, the findings suggest that although distanced self-talk is less frequent, it remains relatively stable and may offer specific emotional benefits in contexts that require preparation or performance.
Broader Implications for Emotional Regulation
The study found that most people frequently engage in self-talk, with participants using self-talk in 61% of the sampled target situations over the two-week period. Immersed self-talk was more common, while distanced self-talk occurred less often but was more stable and trait-like.
Distanced self-talk proved beneficial only in preparatory situations, where it was linked to improved mood over time, supporting prior laboratory findings. However, it was not effective in self-critical or emotion-repairing contexts, possibly because spontaneous distancing in daily life may be shallower than instructed distancing in laboratory conditions.
No associations emerged between self-talk style and individual traits like emotional distress or narcissism, suggesting these patterns are broadly shared across personality types. The study’s strengths include its ecological validity and real-time assessment of self-talk; however, its limitations include self-report bias and a lack of control over other regulatory strategies.
Future research should explore cultural and linguistic differences, developmental origins, and how training might enhance the use of distanced self-talk to promote emotional well-being.