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How do you think?

(36 Posts)
teabagwoman Tue 15-Jul-25 13:14:54

This is a very interesting thread. I think mainly in words. Images do pop into my mind if I’m thinking about people or places but I find it difficult to deliberately summon up an image. I’m hopeless at art etc.

Elusivebutterfly Tue 15-Jul-25 12:19:56

I think both visually and verbally. I cannot work out how you could only do one of them.

ViceVersa Tue 15-Jul-25 12:12:56

Witzend

I definitely think in words - the only subjects I was ever really good at were languages -but I’ve often put that down to the fact that I’m utterly useless at art, whereas people who are good at it ‘see’ things in their heads much more than I do, and are able to transfer their inner visions on to paper.

Absolutely the same for me!

Whethertomorrow Tue 15-Jul-25 12:08:10

This is so interesting.

I don’t know which one I do, I’ve never noticed if I do one or the other consistently.

I do know I don’t think of myself as ‘I’ . It’s always ‘you’. Example you should get up and have a shower. What does that mean? Should I be worried I’m a psychopath or something?

Hope there’s a lot more answers.

Sarnia Tue 15-Jul-25 11:49:50

My dyslexic GD (12) thinks in images. That is why she struggles with words like 'the'. No appropriate image.

GrannyIvy Tue 15-Jul-25 11:44:17

I definitely think in words and I spell long words in my head a lot. The heat has made me forgetful well that’s what I’m blaming it on or DD2 is not clearly giving me my schedule for school holiday childcare😂

misb Tue 15-Jul-25 11:39:47

I think visually all the time-before I go shopping-for example I plan the route visually. Imagine washing the floor beforehand.
However, there is a downside,once I have imagined the task I feel that the job is done,do I really have to do it in reality?
Ugh, too tedious. This is especially true when imagining a walk.
Anyone else think like this?

Magenta8 Tue 15-Jul-25 11:26:21

I think visually and verbally, don't most people? If I think of a person or a place a vague mental image comes to mind or if I am talking or writing then I think in words.

I was a late reader and it took me a very long time to relate the marks on a page to actual words in my head and I still think verbally in terms of the sounds of the words rather than an image of the written word..

J52 Tue 15-Jul-25 10:50:07

You might be interested in googling Gardiner’s Theory of Multiple Intelligences. He describes how we think in different ways, possibly with a dominance.

Witzend Tue 15-Jul-25 10:36:20

I definitely think in words - the only subjects I was ever really good at were languages -but I’ve often put that down to the fact that I’m utterly useless at art, whereas people who are good at it ‘see’ things in their heads much more than I do, and are able to transfer their inner visions on to paper.

Daddima Tue 15-Jul-25 10:30:23

I know this is a strange question, and two things over the last couple of days have got me, well, thinking.
I read that neurodivergent people are more likely to think in images ( visual thinkers) than in words ( verbal thinkers), then a friend who has gone to live in France told me that she had now started to think in French! I am sure I don’t think the words, ‘ I must have a cup of coffee’, nor do I visualise a cup, so I’m confused now.
Is it the heat that has gone for me?