Speaking, Reading
— and Thinking
Three cognitive speeds. Same 100 words. Your results will change how you think about slides.
Most people read this script silently faster than they can read it out loud. That matters. As presenters, when we fill our slides with text, it triggers the urge to read. People start reading, and when we talk over that, we interrupt their concentration. Since reading is faster than speaking, they finish before we do — making us both a distraction and a slowdown. One more thing: in theatre, upstaging means something on stage pulls focus from the speaker. That's what our slides do when overloaded with text. The worst part? We designed them that way. We're upstaged by our own slides.
Or enter your seconds manually if you used your own stopwatch.
Most people read this script silently faster than they can read it out loud. That matters. As presenters, when we fill our slides with text, it triggers the urge to read. People start reading, and when we talk over that, we interrupt their concentration. Since reading is faster than speaking, they finish before we do — making us both a distraction and a slowdown. One more thing: in theatre, upstaging means something on stage pulls focus from the speaker. That's what our slides do when overloaded with text. The worst part? We designed them that way. We're upstaged by our own slides.
Or enter your seconds manually if you used your own stopwatch.
Most people read this script silently faster than they can read it out loud. That matters. As presenters, when we fill our slides with text, it triggers the urge to read. People start reading, and when we talk over that, we interrupt their concentration. Since reading is faster than speaking, they finish before we do — making us both a distraction and a slowdown. One more thing: in theatre, upstaging means something on stage pulls focus from the speaker. That's what our slides do when overloaded with text. The worst part? We designed them that way. We're upstaged by our own slides.
Or enter your seconds manually if you used your own stopwatch.
Takes 60 seconds. Your results are anonymous — and help us understand whether speaking rates vary around the world.
Submit My Results →How do you compare?
Here's what we found when 254 people timed themselves on the same three tasks.
46% of participants finished in 20–29s. The distribution is tight and fast-skewed.
79% of participants needed 30 seconds or more. The distribution trails deep into the slow end.
Drug commercials are required by law to disclose side effects. But there's no rule about how fast they have to say them. The Lunesta sleep aid commercials are a textbook example of deliberate pacing manipulation — slow down the benefits so they stick, speed up the risks so they blur.
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When taking Lunesta, don't drive or operate machinery until you feel fully awake. Walking, eating, driving, or engaging in other activities while asleep without remembering it the next day have been reported. Abnormal behaviors may include aggressiveness, agitation, hallucinations, or confusion. In depressed patients, worsening of depression, including risk of suicide, may occur. Alcohol may increase these risks. Allergic reactions such as tongue or throat swelling occur rarely and may be fatal. Side effects may include unpleasant taste, headache, dizziness and morning drowsiness. Ask your doctor if Lunesta is right for you.
People who are reading don't like to be interrupted — and that's exactly what a presenter does when they read slides aloud. Your audience finishes the slide before you do, then waits. You become the distraction.
When learners are actively processing ideas, they need more time. Rushing delivery forces a choice: listen or think. And when we think while speaking, our own delivery slows — which is actually useful advice for fast talkers.
Effective teaching matches delivery to the thinking rate — the slowest of the three. Pauses aren't silence; they're learning. Give your audience space to catch up, and they'll retain far more.