- New research shows that there’s a performance difference when you talk to yourself in the first person or the second person during a hard workout.
- Cyclists rode faster in a time trial when they addressed themselves with “you” statements compared to using “I” statements.
- Positive self-talk has been used by endurance athletes for years, but this approach provides a distanced perspective that could make a difference in your performance.
Think back to a recent challenging run. When things started to get tough, how did you talk to yourself? Did you say things like “I only have to run another 15 minutes” and “I can do this,” or was it more “you only have to run another 15 minutes” and “you can do this”?
If your answer is that you addressed yourself as “you,” good on ya! According to first-of-its-kind research on self-talk and endurance performance, talking to yourself as if you’re another person should help you run better in challenging workouts.
Researchers at Bangor University in Wales had 16 men do two 10-kilometer time trials on a stationary bike. During one trial, they talked to themselves in the first person (“I”), and in the other, they talked to themselves in the second person (“you”). The researchers measured not only how fast the cyclists rode 10K but also variables such as power output and rating of perceived exertion.
An important point about the study design: In both time trials, the cyclists used positive self-talk. At the beginning of the study, while familiarizing themselves with riding the Run a Faster 5K with Run/Walk Intervals, they were instructed how to convert negative self-talk about a sensation into positive self-talk. For example, if initially they thought “this is tiring,” they were taught to tell themselves “I can do this” or “you can do this.” Positive self-talk has repeatedly been found to help endurance athletes go farther and faster. So what the researchers wanted to know was whether one form of self-address—“I” versus “you”—spurred greater performance.
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You guessed it—when addressing themselves as “you,” the cyclists completed the 10K time trial an average of 2.2 percent faster. (The average time during the first-person trial was 17:48 compared to 17:24 during the second-person trial.) That was the case even though they rated their level of effort the same as during the time trial when they spoke to themselves as “I.”
What might explain the advantage of talking to yourself in the second person when working out? Lead researcher James Hardy, Ph.D., told Runner’s World doing so allows for a distanced perspective that should help you “stand back and observe what is going on, akin to being in the balcony looking down on the dance floor rather than on the dance floor itself. This promotes clearer thinking, better choices, and enhanced performance.”
Noel Brick, Ph.D., a leading researcher on endurance psychology, said that this from-the-balcony vantage point is called “self-distancing.” It can be really effective, Brick said, “when we perform tasks that require willpower and self-control. In effect, we take a step back mentally from what we ourselves are experiencing and take the perspective of a supportive onlooker.”
Mitchell Greene, Ph.D., a sport psychologist in Haverford, Pennsylvania, also counsels this approach. “I emphasize creating some distance for the athlete between the ‘I’ and the ‘you,’” he said. “The thought ‘I can do it’ is more apt to produce the opposite thought, ‘I can’t do it,’ and that increased sense of potential failure can increase pressure, instigate fear, and lower performance.”
Although overall the group performed better when using second-person self-talk, three of the 16 subjects didn’t ride faster when calling themselves “you.” The researchers playfully point out that people who score high for narcissism tend to use more first-person pronouns than most people, and “as the first-person perspective is more central to them,” they might not benefit from the self-distancing perspective.
Of course that bit about narcissism doesn’t apply to you. More generally, Hardy said, any self-talk, including the second-person variety, is unlikely to help people who think primarily visually rather than verbally. (That is, you think mostly in pictures, not words.)
If you’re motivated to investigate this phenomenon during your next hard run, remember Brick’s words “supportive onlooker.” Telling yourself “you’re slow, you suck” instead of “I’m slow, I suck” isn’t what the researchers had in mind when investigating the matter. Use positive phrases such as “you’re more than halfway” or “you can keep up this pace” or simply “you’re doing great.”
Greene advises preparing a list of second-person statements and having a plan for when to use them. “The more prepared you are for the physical and psychological dips you will experience, the more quickly you can go to your self-statements, the less possibility that you will let physical fatigue, the performance of other runners, self-doubt, and negative thoughts slow you down,” he said.
That said, even if a rogue negative statement sneaks in, calling yourself “you” should help you turn it around. “People are more likely to view situations as more threatening from the first-person perspective,” Brick said, “It may be easier to counter ‘you suck’ with ‘no, you don’t, keep going!’”
Scott is a veteran running, fitness, and health journalist who has held senior editorial positions at Runner’s World and Running Times. Much of his writing translates sport science research and elite best practices into practical guidance for everyday athletes. He is the author or coauthor of several running books, including DAA Industry Opt Out, Advanced Marathoning, and Create Your Own Running Mantra. What Molly Huddle Thinks About When She Races Slate, The Atlantic, the Washington Post, and other members of the sedentary media. His lifetime running odometer is past 110,000 miles, but he’s as much in love as ever.
