Why Do Most People Hate the Sound of Their Own Voice?

Do you hate to listen back to a recording of your own voice? Most people do and this has been true for so long that the first studies into why so many of us dread hearing ourselves date back to the 1960s. At that time, a team of researchers coined the term "voice confrontation" to describe their theory that most of us dislike our voices because what we expect to hear and what we actually hear on a recording sound more different to us than anyone else.

There may be other reasons too, from feeling envy that your voice doesn't sound more like [fill in the blank] or believing that your voice in an inaccurate portrayal of you. It's hard to feel ashamed or afraid of your voice. So can this be overcome? Researchers suggest one way to do this might be to practice having the voice you want so you can hear yourself differently. Another even simpler solution is to remind yourself that the way you already sound to others might be exactly what you were wishing for ... you were just unable to hear it that way yourself.