Yoyobon, I understand your need to vent! It frustrates me, too, when I have to ask people to repeat themselves because it seems to me they are speaking too quickly. I don't have a hearing problem either, but apparently my brain doesn't process fast talking as well as it used to.

It's not just in the U.S. that I have a problem with fast talkers. In my experience, a lot of speech seems to have picked up in tempo -- in some regions of the world more than others. I enjoy visiting my brother in Texas, because in the place where he lives people seem to speak much more slowly. Of course, some listeners complain about Texas speech being excruciating in its slowness. At this stage of my life, I prefer the slow talk. :-)

I have a problem with that too! Also the style of speech. At one time young people in Australia, particularly the Eastern States, who provide much of the TV material, used to speak with an upward inflection which sounded like every sentence ended as a question. Now they seem to have a miserable whining tone!

I also have difficulty understanding small squeaking children and need the parent to translate. I think I am losing the ability to hear high register so I mainly watch TV programs with subtitles. When it says a bell rings, I don't hear it. It could be my TV though? :-)

Just today I asked an AT&T representative to repeat what he said. I don't have a hearing problem, but he had run a whole sentence together so as to make it unintelligible. However, I did get my newly increased bill reduced by a whopping $8.00 a month. Sad to say, I got the cable company bill today, and they also have presented me with an increase. Another day, another Happy New Year notice.

I am myself a moderately fast talker, but I used to do customer support for library databases on the phone, and have been told that I speak very clearly. I hope that is true. However, I have noticed that when I am under stress I tend to speak more rapidly. I suspect that could be a problem with clarity. I do try to pay attention to it.

And yes, I think that people in general speak more quickly than they used to. Even worse is that annoying up-talking, when everything they say is a question? As though all their statements are presented for your approval?

Had a similar experience twice while listening to the radio. The first eg was a young American woman talking to a BBC 'presenter'. I stopped what I was doing as I realised I couldn't understand a word she said; her speech was like machine-gun fire. Even after trying to concentrate I still didn't know what the conversation was about . . . and my hearing is, I think, good.

This morning again on the radio a German reporter/politician (?) with a good command of English rattled through his 'piece' leaving me no wiser on what his opinions were.

NB the theme was BREXIT which is almost all we hear on the news these days. I realise this is not a political forum and people elsewhere have little understanding about it's complexities, but I hear the desperate cry throughout our land "We are being driven mad. Get on with it!"

I wonder if the fast talking problem is a result of communication via texting and little skills learned regarding actual spoken exchanges. These younger people tend to speak to everyone like they talk with their BFFs. And if we expect to learn civil exchanges by watching news programs we are really up a creek ! We'll see not only fast talkers but also the pesky problem of speaking over others with louder and louder voices. UGH. We've lost our civilitiy.

yoyo that happens ALL the time over here on TV/radio progs. The Presenters try to get a politician to say/admit something, everyone gets louder and more heated, we, the audience, know there is not going to be a answer, or at least not the one the presenter wants to hear . . . or it ends up "Sorry we're out of time. Let's go over to Jim with the sport/weather report."

Re speed of speech. Here on the edge of the West country locals tend to speak more slowly than their towny cousins, although many women talk in the 'upper registers' almost screechy and easily picked up by bats.

Link below is of two Welsh women speaking. Not quite how our 'local' people speak but should make you smile.

An Interview About an Up-Coming Football Match

I suspect a lot of it has to do with the time spent on calls or face-to-face with customers. I bet those call center people are paid by the call and the faster they can get rid of you and on to the next one, the more money they make. They probably also have quotas and can be reprimanded or fired it they aren't met.

Lately I've found myself interrupting people a lot. It's a nasty habit I need to break.

Donna

Donna, over here nearly all the call-centers are based in India/Pakistan and when they call to tell you that your computer has broken down or your bank has lost your money, even if it is difficult to understand quite what they are saying, at least you know it isn't true. When I questioned one of these 'cold-callers' and hung up the phone he had the cheek to ring me back and shout at me for doubting his honesty . . .

I am SO glad to see this thread! I have noticed the rapid-fire speakers especially during the last decade or so, even here in the South. I take courses at the local college and many of the students come from all parts of the US. I really have a hard time understanding about three-quarters of them. (And the younger professors, too!)

Don't get me started on phone conversations with various companies! I am not prejudiced but I do notice that many at the other end of the phone either have an Hispanic or an Indian accent. I'm told one can always ask to speak to another person. I grow weary of having to ask the individual to repeat themselves or to slow down.

The rapid speech has even spread into television shows and films, I've found. So many of the younger actors "swallow" their words and do not enunciate, at least to my ear.

About a decade or so ago, there was such a thing as "Valley Speak" among the younger generation which grew out of a subculture in California. That was bad enough in terms of difficulties, but the rapid fire speech seems to have spread to all young adults.

Cause? I wish I knew!

okay......my other pet peeve : Off shore "customer service representatives" who think that they are speaking English but are using phrases and expressions that are never heard here. I resent that they read from a prompt and repeat inane statements when asked a direct question. After wasting 20 min of my life talking with an AOL " customer rep" in India, she finally told me I had to pay to speak to a tech representative for what I needed. I suggested to her that she knew this after a few minutes speaking to me and I resented that she wasn't honest enough to tell me before wasting my time. Then AOL has the nerve to send a follow up so I can rate their service !!!

Woodnymph....my DIL is from California and she speaks so rapidly that sometimes it sounds like a foreign language ! I have suggested to her that she slow down .....or perhaps a better suggestion would be to ease back on the caffeine ! Hearing fast talkers actually makes me feel anxious ! Perhaps I'm too much of an emphath and sense their amped up energy !

If Seinfeld were still on the air, no doubt they'd be doing an episode about fast talkers.

At least there don't seem to be "close talkers" ! I think that's more a male thing. You never see women bumping belly to belly when they talk.

I'm remembering the Seinfeld episode about low talkers. Very funny … of course.

Last fall I was scheduled for a medical procedure in our hospital. The young woman (I assume she was young, as she had what I call the "Tiffany" voice) just rattled away and I was lost! So I called back and an actual voice answered all of my questions and I could understand her. What a relief that was..

Someone after my own heart . . . and the older one gets the easier it is to get away with it!

Australians who live in cities are known as fast talkers, those from the country less so.

My main gripe on this subject (leaving out the foreign people in call centres - it's not their fault their English is accented, but I struggle to understand) is listening to people give their mobile phone numbers. We have to ask for these at work, and most answer well for 9 digits and the tenth is so quiet I have to ask again. The problem is then that many people can only recite their number if they go back to the beginning....

Kath, do people say "Oh" or "Zero" for naught? I noticed that there was some comment about this on a current affairs TV show recently. I say "Oh".

I have a problem with the "s" in my surname as apparently it can be heard as an "f" and I was told sternly by someone that I had definitely told him "f" !

As though I don't know my own name! Now if I have to spell it, I say S for Sugar.

I do get some unwanted calls but usually there is a pause or background chatter before the person starts to speak and so I can hang up! However, this was a problem to me recently as usually the calls are before 8pm but I got one at 10.30pm and I had a worrying time in case I had cut off someone who genuinely wanted to speak to me in an emergency.

I have a free landline service but available for incoming calls and emergency outgoing calls only. I cannot monitor who is calling.

And.....speaking of numbers, I find it most annoying when people recite their phone number with a non-traditional cadence. For instance....instead of 123-4567 with each number spoken independently, they choose to say it : 123- forty-five, sixty-seven , making a combo of the cadence. There is a comic routine in Kevin James' show where he addresses this issue with regard to messages left on phones. The caller gives their number : 12- 3- 459- teen.

Ann, it's pretty much a mix of zero and oh - often in the same number!

The one time when mixing them up matters is in e-mail addresses.

I used to work with a girl who talked too quickly for me to follow at times. I was always having to ask her to repeat things.

I occasionally listen to a British semi-amateur podcast. One of the regular presenters (an older man) speaks so quickly that his voice is often a blur. When he’s interested in his topic he gets the bit between his teeth and zooms off at full gallop.

In one hour long interview he finished his (at times unintelligible) talk on a really interesting and apparently well researched topic, then the interviewer said, “We’d better ask for questions as we still have 20 minutes left.” The speaker replied that he knew he spoke too quickly and was trying to make himself slow down but clearly it’s not working.

I find it is slightly annoying when a fast talker excuses themself by admitting they know they talk too fast.......then, why IS it that you are talking if not to communicate. If the other person cannot understand you, then you have failed and need to figure out how to accommodate the rest of the world !! Grrr.