Sometimes, loud or soft voices are simply based on the way we're built, Shah explains. "It can be mechanical," she says. "Everybody is born with a different size larynx and vocal cords within that. Also, some may have smaller lungs and can't generate enough airflow to have a louder voice."
Your voice sounds louder inside your head than it does to other people. The reason is that the sound that you hear is amplified through the bone-conduction in your head, while other people only can hear the sound that is carried through the air in the space around you.
Autophony is the unusually loud hearing of a person's own voice. Possible causes are: The "occlusion effect", caused by an object, such as an unvented hearing aid or a plug of ear wax, blocking the ear canal and reflecting sound vibration back towards the eardrum. Serous otitis media.
You're “swallowing” your voice. It is probably resonating toward the back of your mouth, making it loud in your inner ear but not moving the air outside your mouth much. The best trick for projecting your voice is to visualize the sound as coming from a couple of inches in front of your mouth.
When recorded, you might hear your voice sound shallower than you're used to. This is because the recordings are not affected by the internal resonance and bone conduction that affects how your voice sounds. However, the way your voice sounds on recordings is the way people perceive it in real life.
The actor then gives his solution: To hear your “real” voice, you can place your hands on the sides of your head — between your jawbone and your ears. “That is what you sound like to other people,” he concludes. TikTok users were amazed by the news, although many were upset to learn what they “really” sound like.
When you hear your voice on a recording, you're only hearing sounds transmitted via air conduction. Since you're missing the part of the sound that comes from bone conduction within the head, your voice sounds different to you on a recording.
The discomfort we have over hearing our voices in audio recordings is probably due to a mix of physiology and psychology. For one, the sound from an audio recording is transmitted differently to your brain than the sound generated when you speak.
Being soft-spoken is not a bad thing. You're probably a wonderful listener and people love talking to you. But sometimes, we need to speak with a louder volume so that people can actually hear the important things we have to say.
Those vibrations travel up through your bony skull and again set the ear drum vibrating. However as they travel through the bone they spread out and lower in pitch, giving you a false sense of bass. Then when you hear a recording of your voice, it sounds distinctly higher.
While hearing voices can be a symptom of some mental health problems, not everyone who hears voices has a mental illness. Hearing voices is actually quite a common experience: around one in ten of us will experience it at some point in our lives. Hearing voices is sometimes called an 'auditory hallucination'.
Individuals with ADHD may have trouble with emotional regulation and hypersensitivity to touch, sounds, and light.
Misophonia is a disorder in which certain sounds trigger emotional or physiological responses that some might perceive as unreasonable given the circumstance. Those who have misophonia might describe it as when a sound “drives you crazy.” Their reactions can range from anger and annoyance to panic and the need to flee.
Question your motives. Some people speak loudly because they feel that they are not being heard. Another reaction to this feeling is constantly repeating yourself. If you find yourself doing these things, the cause of speaking loudly could be related to your need to have your thoughts heard.
Cavities in the sinuses, the nose, and the back of the throat grow bigger, creating more space in the face that gives your voice more room to echo. All of these factors cause your voice to get deeper. Think of a guitar.
If your voice is tired, your throat feels tight, or it hurts to talk, you may have muscle tension dysphonia, or voice strain caused by muscle tightness. This common voice problem can occur even if your vocal cords are normal but the muscles in your throat are working inefficiently.
However, don't stress if you think your voice sounds a little weird – only 38% of people immediately recognize their recorded speech. Plus, studies have found that people tend to rate their own voices far more negatively than others do.
You're Not Alone
We're predisposed to hate the sound of our own speech. It's irrational, and it's normal. Embrace it and don't worry about it. It's worth remembering, the way you hear your voice is different from the way other people hear it.
Question : Is it normal for a singer to dislike the sound of their own voice? Answer : Yes it is totally normal — and not just for singers, but most people don't like the sound of their voice when they hear it on a recording and you are definitely not alone if hearing your own voice makes you cringe.
You are hearing what your voice actually sounds like to other people. This is typically somewhat different from the way it sounds to you. This is because you hear the sound resonating through your head bones and sinuses, and other people do not hear that.
Different brains experience internal speech differently (and some not at all) Most people have some level of internal monologue going through their heads throughout their day, however there is a small group of people who do not experience any self-talk at all.
People perceive their own voice to be the combination of those two sources of sound, but everyone else just hears the external stimulus. This is why when you listen to your voice in a recording, it sounds different than the voice you're used to.