Why We Talk: Most Speech Influences Rather Than Informs
Speech might be so subjective because objectivity was never its purpose.
Posted November 13, 2025 | Reviewed by Michelle Quirk
Very little of what we say to other people is designed to inform them about something. Instead, we speak to have an effect on them. For example, a suspect needs an alibi, and a witness tells the police they spent the entire evening together. The witness may not be providing factual information about the suspect’s whereabouts. Instead, the statement communicates that the witness thinks the suspect is innocent. Conversely, if they did spend the evening together but the witness thinks the suspect is guilty, the witness may tell the police he isn’t sure.
If speech evolved to inform, it’s hard to understand why it’s so unreliable. If it evolved to entertain, seduce, and impress (Miller, 2000), then reliability is not expected. Miller argues that our big brains, along with language, did not evolve only to master the physical environment; they evolved in what biologists call an arms race (a competitive stimulus for evolution, like fast cheetahs and fast gazelles) between those trying to impress others (especially men) and those trying not to be fooled (especially women).
A person may say they were abused as a child to gain sympathy, to justify bad behavior, or to gain an ally. It’s rare to find someone providing this information without an ulterior motive. But even whether they were actually abused can be up for debate. In one context, a handful of memories of an angry parent may be emphasized to create a sense of abuse; in another context, these memories may be the exceptions to the rule of having been taken care of. The facts are cherry-picked for what they mean.
Lawyers, of course, cherry-pick and introduce evidence that supports the story they are trying to tell about a case. We all do this all the time, but the story we are trying to tell is usually about how the world works and what our role is within it.
When listeners try to ascertain what really happened based on a verbal report, they are taking on a difficult task. Sure, when the grocer says the mustard is in aisle 7, it’s probably true, its probability increasing with certainty about why it was said. If someone stopped you on the street with the same statement, you would give its factual correctness less credence because you wouldn’t be sure why it was said. Along the same lines, if you ask your roommate where the Fritos are, and they say they’re all gone, the context is clear and the message is that there aren’t any Fritos. If they make the same statement out of the blue, the message is the effect on you—for example, that you ought to buy some more Fritos.
Much strife can be avoided by not worrying too much about whether a statement is literally true. If you’re not in the role of jurist, journalist, or scientist, and if you’re not in danger, literal truth probably doesn’t matter that much. Since our species is very bad at objectivity and very good at storytelling, it’s fortunate that the story usually matters more than the facts. Asking a human to report facts would be like asking Michael Jordan to play poker: He can do it, but he’s much better at something else.
It doesn’t really matter if it’s true or false if a guy says on a first date that he made a killing in bitcoin. Either way, he’s saying he wants to impress you, and he’s showing what he thinks you’ll find impressive. If a sibling remembers an incident of you being recklessly irresponsible as a teenager , you may feel compelled to argue about whether it really happened that way, but what really matters is that that’s how the sibling still sees you.
Speech is unreliable as an indicator of what really happened. That’s what forensic scientists mean when they say that eyewitness testimony is unreliable. On the other hand, speech is an excellent indicator of the self-experience the speaker is promoting, and it’s an excellent indicator of the speaker’s appraisal of the listener. Eyewitnesses are generally trying to say the right thing, to serve the ends of the system. Thoughtful and imaginative people are well aware that it is very difficult to report accurately on what happened. Unreflective people are certain about what they saw, but they are not good at correcting their initial impressions, because it doesn’t occur to them that they might have gotten it wrong.
Good therapists are trained to minimize their reliance on speech as journalism—as evidence of what happened—and to focus instead on what the patient is up to in choosing what to speak about. The value of speech as an accurate report, as noted, increases when the reason for speaking is clear, but it still never gets to a point of being very reliable. I doubt therapy patients very often misrepresent the number of siblings they have when asked, although I have met dozens of parents being evaluated for parental fitness who failed to mention kids who had already been taken away from them. The point here, though, is that the utility of speech as metaphor improves when the person is not responding to direct questioning. Consequently, therapists are trained to ask open-ended questions, or, even better, not to ask questions at all.
The idea that speech is mainly intended to influence rather than inform has its own pitfalls. It suggests that the way someone makes us feel is the intended purpose of a speech act. While that is often true, it’s an idea that can be abused. It leads to the assertion that if anyone is offended, then the speaker was offensive. Instead, listeners are advised to question what self-experience they themselves are promoting, and what construction of the speaker they are trying to impose.
To find a therapist, visit the Psychology Today Therapy Directory .
Miller, G. F. (2000). The Mating Mind: How Sexual Choice Shaped the Evolution of Human Nature . Doubleday.
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Michael Karson, Ph.D. , is a retired professor from the University of Denver.
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This article is part of the Bringwise Psychology Journal — daily insights on human behavior, mental health, and personal growth.