Researchers have found a women says about 20,000 words a day on an average and a man about 7,000 words a day average.
If you are a professional speaker or anyone who talks in front of an audience , you would be more aware of what and how to speak.
But when you have day to day conversations, you are not as careful when you talk. You do not prepare for your day-to-day conversations. You speak impromptu and you tend to pause, think and rethink and fill up these moments with some verbal sounds or words – the filler word.
A filler is defined as a sound or word that is spoken in conversation by one participant to signal to others that he/she has paused to think but has not yet finished speaking.
It has become more common these days for most professionals to use filler words as they speak. These small little words, don’t seem to bother at first but they quickly become a habit and could degrade one’s brand and credibility.
“So, for example, like when I go to an Italian restaurant, I order a pasta dish. ”
“I just want to talk about this project schedule”
“Is everybody here? All right, let’s get started.”
“This is good business. Now, the important thing here is revenue.”
“The last step is to send an email. Okay, are there any questions?”
In a recent post on Language Log, the University of Pennsylvania linguistics professor Mark Liberman shared data showing that women are more likely to use “um” and men are more likely to use “uh” during pauses in conversation.
Why do we use filler words?
- We are still thinking what we want to say. We fill up with these filler words as we think and find the right words. In other words, we are not prepared.
- We think we should not pause to think. Silence is discomforting and we want to fill it up with something – we use filler words.
- We, sometimes, imitate the way others talk. If others around us use more filler words in their conversation, we tend to use those words too. This is lack of awareness on using filler words.
Um… But What’s the Problem? Whats wrong with using filler words?
- Audience will lose interest in what you are saying.
- Audience will sense your lack of authority on the subject
- Audience will sense your insecurity
- Audience will lose focus and attention
- Your credibility and brand is at stake.
What are the most common filler words we need to be aware of?
Filler Sounds
- Aa
- Um
- Oh/Uh
- Like
- Just
- Well
- So
- Very
- And
- Okay
- Now
- Maybe
- Actually
- Really
- Hopefully
- Possibly
- Mostly
- Basically
- Literally
- Seriously
- Whatever
- I guess
- I don’t know
- I mean
- Kind of – Good to , kind of, have this information.
- Sort of
- I think
- You know
- All right
- Like I said
How do you overcome these challenges?
- The most important step to overcome this is being self-aware. Observe yourself as you speak or have someone observe you and make a note of the filler words you use.
- The next step is to practice , practice and practice consciously avoid using these filler words as you speak. A Toast Masters club is a good place to practice and hone your speaking skills – all the speakers here are evaluated for the use of filler words in their speech.
- Write down common scripts that you can use on a daily basis and practice them. This helps you talk fluently and without having to pause and use filler words.
- Practice talking without filler words on your favorite topics and topics that you have most command in. You will pause less when you talk about the topics you know.
- Learn to pause strategically. When you need to think , pause, without uttering filler words or sounds. This kind of silence also grabs your audience attention and is often used by professional speakers when they are about to say something important.
- Once you get a hang of it, you will be able to reduce the usage of filler words in your impromptu speech as well.