What Distanced Self-Talk Sounds Like
Talking to yourself as "you" or by your own name, instead of "I", is among the cheapest calming techniques psychology has tested. It helps a little, mostly for minutes, and the grammar seems to matter as much as the kindness.
Answer to the question
Does talking to yourself in the third person help?
A little, and mostly in the moment. Talking to yourself by name or as "you", asking "Why is Sam so nervous?" instead of "Why am I so nervous?", is distanced self-talk. In Ethan Kross's 2014 experiments with 585 people it cut distress and improved rated performance, though a 2022 meta-analysis of 48 experiments found the effects small.
Key takeaways
- Distanced self-talk means addressing yourself as "you" or by name; in Ethan Kross's 2014 studies of 585 people it reduced distress and improved rated performance.
- Brain recordings in 2017, and a 2022 replication with 67 people, found the switch calmed emotional responses without signs of extra mental effort.
- A 2022 meta-analysis of 48 experiments found self-distancing effects small, with pronouns alone weaker than picturing and talking a scene through.
- Tone is less predictable than advice suggests: in Joanne Wood's 2009 study, people with low self-esteem felt worse after repeating "I'm a lovable person".
Suppose that ten minutes before an interview your inner voice runs its usual loop: I am going to freeze, I always freeze. Change two words and the voice starts giving advice: Sam, you have answered harder questions than these. Talking to yourself as "you" or by name, which psychologists call distanced self-talk, does make people calmer in a hard moment. The gain is small and mostly measured over minutes, but it holds up well enough to be worth using, and the grammar of the question seems to matter at least as much as how kindly it is worded.
Testing the Pronoun Switch
The instruction fits in a sentence. When you talk yourself through something difficult, address yourself as "you" or by your first name, the way you would speak to a friend, instead of saying "I". In the instructions Ethan Kross and his colleagues wrote for their experiments, a participant called Jane would ask "Why did Jane feel this way?" where the comparison group asked "Why did I feel this way?"
Their paper, published in 2014, reported seven studies with 585 people. In one, 89 students had five minutes to prepare a speech on why they were qualified for their dream job, to be given to a panel of evaluators. Before speaking, half reflected on their nerves with "I" and "my", and half with "you" and their own name. Across the studies, people using the distanced form were rated by observers as performing better in the speech and in a first meeting with a stranger, reported less distress, and spent less time afterwards going back over what had gone wrong. Trait social anxiety did not change these results.
If the switch were only effortful self-control under another name, it ought to show up in the brain as extra work. Jason Moser, Kross and colleagues looked for that in 2017. In one study, 29 students viewed disturbing and neutral photographs while their brain's electrical activity was recorded; in a second, 50 adults recalled painful memories inside a scanner. Distanced self-talk by name shrank the emotional response to the photographs, and during the memories it reduced reported distress and activity in a medial prefrontal region, with no added activity in the areas linked to deliberate control.
Five years later the group repeated the photograph study with 67 people, and the smaller emotional response appeared again, with no sign of extra effort. That paper also meant to compare distanced self-talk with detached reappraisal, the textbook technique of viewing a scene coolly on purpose, and could not, because the reappraisal effect itself failed to appear. Away from the laboratory, a 2019 Bangor University study found that 16 physically active men rode a 10 km cycling time trial faster, and with more power, after second-person rather than first-person self-talk, while rating the effort as no harder.
Rehearsals Rewritten by Name
Each row below shows distanced self-talk in practice: it keeps the question fixed and changes only who is being addressed, which is the whole of the technique. Sam stands in for you, and the questions are starting points to adapt to your own situation.
| Moment | First person | Second person | Own name |
|---|---|---|---|
| Before an interview | Why am I so nervous about this? | Why are you so nervous about this? | Why is Sam so nervous about this? |
| Before an exam | What do I actually know for this paper? | What do you actually know for this paper? | What does Sam actually know for this paper? |
| Before a hard conversation | What do I want from this talk with my sister? | What do you want from this talk with your sister? | What does Sam want from this talk with his sister? |
| Before a purchase | Do I need this jacket, or the feeling of buying it? | Do you need this jacket, or the feeling of buying it? | Does Sam need this jacket, or the feeling of buying it? |
The interview row sits closest to a tested case. It mirrors the dream-job speech in the 2014 paper, where the people who addressed themselves by name were judged to speak better and dwelt less on the speech once it was over.
Nobody has run the exam row as an experiment. If you try it, try it on a past paper first; the hope is that a question put to Sam draws out an inventory of what he knows, where the same question put to "I" tends to draw out a list of gaps.
The conversation row borrows from research on wise reasoning. Igor Grossmann and Kross asked students in relationships to imagine that a partner had admitted being unfaithful. People reasoned less wisely about their own case than about a friend's, until they were told to use their own name and third-person pronouns, at which point the gap disappeared. The paper's title gives that gap a name, Solomon's paradox.
The purchase row draws on a 2020 study of 244 people making food choices. Participants who were not dieting chose more healthily with distanced self-talk, and dieters gained most when it was paired with a reminder of their health goal. A shopping decision has a similar shape, a want in the moment set against a goal held over time, so keep it to one short question rather than a long inner debate: a decision you are asked to explain at length can drift away from what you actually liked.
Kind Words, Plain Grammar
Most popular advice about self-talk concerns tone rather than grammar. James Doty's Mind Magic (2024), a book on intention and visualisation by a Stanford neurosurgeon, makes the case in its six-week programme. On p. 233, in a self-compassion practice, it states that negative self-talk gravely impacts health and mental well-being.
On that much the research agrees with the book: the way you speak to yourself matters.
The research adds three things. The first is that the best evidence of harm concerns a habit. A 2008 review led by Susan Nolen-Hoeksema concluded that rumination, turning a problem over and over, worsens depression and predicts its onset more consistently than its duration.
The second is that friendlier wording is not reliably better. In 2009 Joanne Wood and colleagues found that people with low self-esteem who repeated the affirmation "I'm a lovable person" felt worse afterwards, while people with high self-esteem felt better only to a limited degree. A 2011 review of 47 sport studies found that positive, instructional and motivational self-talk helped performance, and that negative self-talk did not impede it.
The third is that address does a job tone cannot. Asking "What does Sam want?" leaves the words just as blunt and still moves the vantage point outside the experience, which may suit people who find affirmations hollow. Anyone who already talks to themselves kindly loses nothing by adding the name.
Asking "What does Sam want?" leaves the words just as blunt and still moves the vantage point outside the experience.
The Limits of Calm
The largest summary so far is a 2022 meta-analysis of 48 experiments on self-distancing, the broader family to which distanced self-talk belongs. It found a small effect on how strongly people felt, consistent across ages and cultures. Within that family, the pronoun switch on its own did less well than methods combining picturing a scene from the outside with writing or talking it through.
Other tests have returned half the result. In a 2023 Melbourne study, 355 people wrote about an interpersonal conflict in either the first person or the second and third person. Distanced writing raised positive feeling and left negative feeling where it was.
Distance does not automatically make people kinder, either. Across three experiments with 774 people, those who used third-person self-talk while deciding how to split money with a stranger kept more of it for themselves. Before a purchase that may be exactly what you want; before a hard conversation with your sister it may not be.
Most of the studies above that found a benefit list Kross or Moser among their authors, and most used short laboratory tasks, measuring feelings over minutes rather than months. Whether the habit changes anything over a year is untested.
Whether the habit changes anything over a year is untested.
Language may set a limit as well. Japanese routinely leaves out the subject of a sentence, and a 2024 study put the switch to 411 Japanese undergraduates.
Second-person self-talk did nothing for their anagram scores or their motivation compared with first-person, subjectless or no self-talk.
Common questions
Does talking to yourself in the third person help?
A little. In laboratory tests distanced self-talk usually helps, by a small margin. Kross's 2014 studies, a 2017 brain study and a 2022 replication all found calmer responses. A 2022 meta-analysis of 48 experiments found the pronoun method weaker than richer forms of distancing, and a 2024 study of 411 Japanese students found no benefit.
What are examples of distanced self-talk?
Talking to yourself by name or as "you", not "I". Before an interview you ask Why is Sam so nervous about this? instead of Why am I so nervous? Ethan Kross's 2014 studies used this switch before speeches and first meetings, and Grossmann and Kross used it for an imagined infidelity.
Is negative self-talk bad for your health?
Repetitive negative thinking does harm: a 2008 review led by Susan Nolen-Hoeksema found rumination predicts the onset of depression. The picture for tone alone is mixed. A 2011 review of 47 sport studies found negative self-talk did not impede performance, and a 2009 study found a positive statement made people with low self-esteem feel worse.
Sources
Kross, E., Bruehlman-Senecal, E., Park, J., Burson, A., Dougherty, A., Shablack, H., Bremner, R., Moser, J., & Ayduk, O. (2014). 'Self-talk as a regulatory mechanism: How you do it matters.' Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 106(2), 304-324. doi:10.1037/a0035173. Full text read: seven studies, total N = 585; Study 2, 97 undergraduate women, first-impression interaction with a confederate; Study 3, 89 undergraduates (45 first person, 44 non-first person), five minutes to prepare a dream-job speech; non-first-person instructions used 'you' and the participant's own name ('Why did Jane feel this way?').
Moser, J. S., Dougherty, A., Mattson, W. I., Katz, B., Moran, T. P., Guevarra, D., Shablack, H., Ayduk, O., Jonides, J., Berman, M. G., & Kross, E. (2017). 'Third-person self-talk facilitates emotion regulation without engaging cognitive control: Converging evidence from ERP and fMRI.' Scientific Reports, 7, 4519. doi:10.1038/s41598-017-04047-3. Full text read: ERP study, 29 of 37 undergraduates analysed, IAPS images, reduced late positive potential with no change in stimulus preceding negativity; fMRI study, 50 of 52 adults analysed, less distress and reduced medial prefrontal activity, no added cognitive-control activity.
Grossmann, I., & Kross, E. (2014). 'Exploring Solomon's paradox: Self-distancing eliminates the self-other asymmetry in wise reasoning about close relationships in younger and older adults.' Psychological Science, 25(8), 1571-1580. doi:10.1177/0956797614535400. Full text read (author proof): three studies, N = 693; infidelity scenario; Study 2, 120 University of Michigan students, distanced conditions used own name and third-person pronouns; self-distanced reasoning did not differ from reasoning about a friend.
Webster, C. T., Berg, M. K., Kross, E., & Moser, J. S. (2022). 'An event-related potential investigation of distanced self-talk: Replication and comparison to detached reappraisal.' International Journal of Psychophysiology, 177, 122-132. doi:10.1016/j.ijpsycho.2022.05.003. Abstract read: 67 participants; direct replication of reduced LPP without increased SPN; detached reappraisal effect failed to replicate, so no direct comparison was made.
Guo, L. (2022). 'Reflect on emotional events from an observer's perspective: a meta-analysis of experimental studies.' Cognition and Emotion, 36(8), 1531-1554. doi:10.1080/02699931.2022.2134094. Abstract read: 48 studies, 102 effect sizes, small overall effect (g = -0.26); visual-plus-verbal approaches stronger than visual-only or pronoun approaches; consistent across age and culture.
Magata, Y., & Tanaka, A. (2024). 'The effect of second-person self-talk on performance and motivation in Japanese individuals.' PLoS ONE, 19(6), e0305251. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0305251. Abstract read: 411 undergraduates, four groups, anagram task; no significant differences in performance or intrinsic motivation.
Nasarudin, A., Moeck, E. K., & Koval, P. (2023). 'Re-appraising stressors from a distance: effects of linguistic distancing on cognitive appraisals and emotional responses to interpersonal conflict.' Cognition and Emotion, 37(7), 1281-1289. doi:10.1080/02699931.2023.2258570. Abstract read: N = 355; distanced reflection increased positive affect but did not reduce negative affect.
Gainsburg, I., Sowden, W. J., Drake, B., Herold, W., & Kross, E. (2022). 'Distanced self-talk increases rational self-interest.' Scientific Reports, 12, 511. doi:10.1038/s41598-021-04010-3. Abstract read: three experiments, N = 774, dictator game; third-person self-talk led participants to keep more money.
Furman, C. R., Kross, E., & Gearhardt, A. N. (2020). 'Distanced self-talk enhances goal pursuit to eat healthier.' Clinical Psychological Science, 8(2), 366-373. doi:10.1177/2167702619896366. Abstract read: N = 244; non-dieters made healthier choices with distanced self-talk; dieters benefited most from distanced self-talk combined with a health prime.
Hardy, J., Thomas, A. V., & Blanchfield, A. W. (2019). 'To me, to you: How you say things matters for endurance performance.' Journal of Sports Sciences, 37(18), 2122-2130. doi:10.1080/02640414.2019.1622240. Abstract read: 16 physically active males, Bangor University, crossover design; 10 km time trial faster with second-person self-talk, greater power output, similar RPE.
Nolen-Hoeksema, S., Wisco, B. E., & Lyubomirsky, S. (2008). 'Rethinking rumination.' Perspectives on Psychological Science, 3(5), 400-424. doi:10.1111/j.1745-6924.2008.00088.x. Abstract read: rumination exacerbates depression and predicts onset more consistently than duration.
Wood, J. V., Perunovic, W. Q., & Lee, J. W. (2009). 'Positive self-statements: Power for some, peril for others.' Psychological Science, 20(7), 860-866. doi:10.1111/j.1467-9280.2009.02370.x. Abstract read: low self-esteem participants who repeated 'I'm a lovable person' felt worse; high self-esteem participants felt better to a limited degree.
Tod, D., Hardy, J., & Oliver, E. (2011). 'Effects of self-talk: A systematic review.' Journal of Sport and Exercise Psychology, 33(5), 666-687. doi:10.1123/jsep.33.5.666. Abstract read: 47 studies; positive, instructional and motivational self-talk benefited performance; negative self-talk did not impede performance.
Doty, J. R. (2024). Mind Magic: The Neuroscience of Manifestation and How It Changes Everything. Avery. Read in full by this publication, with a reliability audit. p. 233, the self-compassion practice in the six-week programme: negative self-talk is said to gravely impact health and mental well-being, with no citation.