Why do we, like, hesitate when we, um, speak? - Lorenzo García-Amaya

Why do we fill pauses in speech with words like “um,” “uh,” and “like”? Dig into the hesitation phenomenon to find out their linguistic significance.

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For as long as we’ve had language, some people have tried to control it. And some of the most frequent targets of this communication regulation are the ums, ers, and likes that pepper our conversations. These linguistic fillers occur roughly 2 to 3 times per minute in natural speech. So are ums and uhs just a habit we can’t break? Or is there more to them? Lorenzo García-Amaya investigates.

Lesson by Lorenzo García-Amaya, directed by Yael Reisfeld.

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[marchmallow]

ending a sentence with "lol" has the same kind of effect lol

[pratyush]

The back of my highschool english book says:

"I know what to say, I just don't know how to say it"
--a student

[fergochan]

I never become fluent enough in Japanese to know if this is true, but I always remember my teacher saying that ええと and あの were important to learn and say, and it really coloured my perception of the function of ums and aahs in English before I'd ever heard the terms "filled pauses" and "discourse markers". Honestly, for me the best thing about learning other languages has been how much it has helped me understand my own.

[DoctorX]

I always found it fascinating that English tends to have "uhh" and "umm", which just seem like a simple random noise [particularly "uhh"], but the fillers for other languages seem to be more complex than just a simple sound.

[adamgreene]

TED just doesn’t run out of art styles, do they.

[IcecreamCat]

This is also amazing for storytelling (and texting overall)

When you use filled pauses in dialogue in story writing, it makes the character speaking sound more human, and not so much a robot and static. Take the following sentences:


"I got the papers back to the boss." Sounds confident, but what if I want to make the character sound more... hesitant or shy? I would add an "uh..." somewhere in the sentence.
"I uh... got the papers back to the boss." The placement of "uh..." here makes the sentence sound more casual
"Uh... I got the papers back to the boss." Now the character sounds more hesitant
"I got the papers back to the uh... boss." This puts emphasis on "boss", and in this context, it sounds like we're unsure about who we actually gave these 'papers' to

These words make dialogue more natural in writing, adding in emotion and changing the mood of the sentence. So thank you for adding these in the human language

[tevin]

I like how positive the comment section are

as usual

[amiraaxel]

No one:
Me to a toddler: _"Um... Quantum Physics."_

[FinancialShinanigan]

Like...
* Important word incoming *
...like you know...

[Tonnidas]

2:29
A VIW - very important word coming from a red carpet - the tounge. How creative!
Ted-Ed's animators are so good at their job! Love them!

[DoomFinger]

I practiced a lot in my social and public speaking to just make a silent pause every time I was about to say 'um'. It actually makes your speech more dramatic and causes people to pay closer attention. Silence is uncomfortable which makes people yearn for it to end and anticipate when the speaking will continue.

[alexharvey]

Yeah, well, you know, that's just, like, your opinion, man.

[kaleighlin]

Has anyone met one of those people that say “like” every other word and end up paying attention to the number of times they say “like” rather than what they’re saying?

[firelow]

I laughed at "two to three times per minute" because my friend's thirty second audios have like 20 filler words in them

[taneshqas.]

This video was so pleasing to watch. The people behind it deserve all the praise in the world

[llfn]

Reading the title: "um I'm not sure why we like do that??"

[zee]

As someone who uses "like", and "I mean" a lot in casual conversations, I immediately clicked the video after I saw the title

[mihaildraganov]

This video was so well animated, I can`t believe the level of pay raise this person deserves

[Sugarist]

Sometimes I just straight up tell my friends to “give me a minute I can’t think of the word” and then completely forget about what I was talking about in the first place

[valentino]

I have a friend who doesn't fill her pauses, so she'll just go silent mid-sentence and IT'S SO WEIRDDDD