Why I don't listen to voice messages

*Pop*. Another instant message notification appears on my phone from one of my group chats. I take a quick moment to peek at the notification in the midst of what I'm currently doing and see that it's a voice message. Ugh. I continue doing what I'm doing, almost as if nothing had happened, hoping that subsequent messages provide some context into what the voice message was about.

I've never been a fan of voicemail. I can see that I've got a missed call, I'll call you back when I've got a chance. I'm not going to dial the voicemail number, listen to the IVR, then listen to the message. Wherever possible, I'll disable voicemail the first chance I get when I get a new number. If I can't disable it (for example, if it's a work policy), then I'll be honest and say in my greeting that I don't listen to voicemails and that I'll see I've got a missed call.

Voice messages are a similar kettle of fish. I cringe whenever I see someone sending me a voice message. Sometimes I'll even ask them to resend it as text. I'm not 100% sure if this is due to the ADHD traits I exhibit, whether it's because I'm so busy, or a combination of the two.

Recently, one of my ASD analytical traits kicked in and got me thinking about why don't I like listening to voice messages? My hearing is fine. I listen to podcasts occasionally. I watch a lot of videos online - educational and entertainment wise, albeit sped up to about double the normal speed.

The first station the train of thought visited was researching how fast people speak. According to Dr Google, the average rate of conversational speech is around 150 words per minute (WPM), with Tony Robbins averaging 201 WPM for his presentations. Given that I've heard people like Tony Robbins speak at double speed, and most of it is gibberish to me, I'm going to use the "conservative" figure of 150 WPM and double it - giving a figure of around 300 WPM that I can listen to while still making some sense of what is going on.

The next station takes me back to my uni days and the concept one of my lecturers taught me about prioritising reading material, which I use religiously on my inbox. The concept is bin, skim, read or study. The level of importance and/or urgency of the underlying information determines how much time I spend reading it. Usually, the headline or first sentence in a paragraph is where this determination takes place, which is why it's so important to have a good hook when writing copy.

Anyway, stuff that is considered rubbish or spam usually goes straight into the bin and is not read. Content that might have some relevant information, or provides me with an FYI, gets skimmed over. This is the default setting for me. Content that I know is reasonably important I'll read through to get a good understanding of what is going on. Finally, if something is of critical importance and needs to be referred to in the future, it will be studied. Often, I may skim something and flag it for reading or study at a future date if it's not urgent.

While I've been using this concept for a number of years now, the thought of applying a WPM rate to these categories didn't occur to me until recently. Having done some online reading tests, I determined that my "skim" rate of reading is around 2000 WPM, which is very high. My "read" rate is around 1000WPM and my "study" rate is around 500 WPM. As you might expect, my level of comprehension increased as the read rate decreased. Regardless, even the lower read rate is significantly higher than the highest listen rate at double the normal speed.

Now, the final stop the thought train makes is at the typing WPM station. The average person can type at around 40-50 WPM, possibly more if they use something like Swype and/or word prediction (Swype is where a user swipes their finger to type, instead of pressing each button individually). This makes for an interesting observation (possibly) - what's quicker for the sender of a message isn't necessarily going to be quicker for the recipient. Perhaps a good compromise is voice to text, when autocorrect doesn't wreak havoc with the translation (fellow Ken Behrans)?

So there you have it, an insight into how my neurodiverse brain works at times. While this topic might be something so trivial as voicemail, the analytical elements can be applied to so many other situations. For example, while I've formally completed very few qualifications in programming, I've taught myself to program in many different languages using similar analytical and research skills (don't get me started on C++ pointers though).

This is just one of the advantages that myself and some of my fellow neurodiversites(?) might be able to use to help overcome issues that others might get stuck with. And while I have many advantages and disadvantages into how my brain works, others out there are able to achieve things that I can only dream of. Such is the beauty of the brain, and such is the beauty of neurodiversity...