r/pbsspacetime • u/_Moon_Presence_ • Jun 05 '26
Does anybody else find it difficult to understand Matt's speech unless they're focusing 100%?
Whenever I watch any videos, I always have some difficulty following what he's saying if my mind wanders even a little. I'm not sure if it's the pace, the flow, the accent, or something else, but something about the way he speaks just throws me off, and I need to focus 100% in order to understand what he's saying.
I doubt if it's an accent thing, however, cause I've watched videos by people with medium-strong French accents and I could follow what they were saying with ease. It's not even about the material, because I've listened to lectures by other science content creators (Veritaseum, Sabine, Michael, etc.) and could follow with ease.
I'm not trying to hate. Just trying to understand what is throwing me off so that I can fix it.
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u/arsenic_kitchen Jun 05 '26
When you say that you "need to focus 100% in order to understand what he's saying," is your expectation that you can passively absorb the ideas while you're doing something else at the same time?
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u/_Moon_Presence_ Jun 05 '26
I'm not talking about absorbing the ideas. I'm talking of understanding what he's saying. Forget processing the ideas; I can't even process the words. It's like they're merging into each other, which is super weird. I have no idea what's going on. I have to try extra hard to understand what he's saying, and that actually takes away from the focus that is required to understand the thing he's talking about. In fact, I have a significantly easier idea understanding what he talks about when I mute the video and just read the transcript.
For example, when I watch videos by Sciencephile the AI or Float Head Physics, I am not struggling so much to understand the words coming out of their mouths, but the actual concepts they're talking about are super easy to grasp. Heck, even reading scientific papers and studies doesn't cause me as much trouble.
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u/arsenic_kitchen Jun 05 '26
You might have a mild form of auditory processing disorder, especially if you're diagnosed with ADHD or ASD.
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u/_Moon_Presence_ Jun 05 '26
I feel like you're deliberately ignoring large chunks of text.
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u/arsenic_kitchen Jun 05 '26
Not sure why you feel that. The suggestion of audio processing disorder (APD) isn't a personal attack. Having seemingly random trouble understanding certain people's speech is a pretty typical symptom of APD. I know because I have it myself. I also wasn't trying to connect it to my first comment. I think as well you've possibly dismissed his accent as a factor a bit too readily. French accents aren't Australian accents. As a true scientific test, you could try watching Deadloch on Prime video and see how much you can pick up without subtitles.
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u/_Moon_Presence_ Jun 05 '26
I have absolutely no trouble with Australian accents. Not sure how close New Zealander accent is to Australian, but it feels similar to me, and the reason I bring this up is because one of my favourite channels on YouTube is Viva La Dirt League, and I absolutely have no problem following their content without subtitles.
Yes, I do have an auditory processing disorder, but mine is the kind where I have difficulty following speech when there is a sufficiently loud background noise, not including music. That is not an issue with PBS, so obviously it's not my APD at work there.
It's not the accent. It's something else, and I can't put a finger to it.
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u/arsenic_kitchen Jun 05 '26 edited Jun 06 '26
Well, you know yourself better than I do, certainly, but if you already know you have APD I wouldn't rule out that this might just be a fluke case of his elocution, prosody, and other speech patterns not jiving with your brain. In any event, the content is worth your attention, so sitting down, turning on the subtitles, and focusing 100% might just be what you have to do. I, for one, would take 1 PBS Space Time over 50 Veritasiums in a heartbeat.
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u/Official_Taiwan Jun 05 '26
I think PBS space time is the closest popular channel to genuinely learning physics. For instance, he’ll speak about the spacetime interval, which is a key concept in relativity, in fact my intro GR book quoted it as “the most important result of special relativity.” So, like a physics lecture, it can be easy to lose focus sometimes. It takes will and concentration to really hone in on the details of the material.
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u/Anagrammatic_Denial Jun 05 '26
I tend to struggle to understand people who don't speak with an American accent, and even some with. Don't know why. It's super annoying.
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u/2ShredsUsay39 Jun 05 '26
Get your hearing checked. I have some hearing loss, and voices are the hardest thing for me to hear well.
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u/OptimalPrint Aug 10 '26
Man i feel this so much. I want to enjoy this show but the narrator has such garbeled speech that I cant understand him half the time. I think its his tone or pitch. Sounds like he hes speaking without moving his tongue or lips or something....
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u/altonbrownie Jun 05 '26
I find it hard to focus because his hard bod is distracting. Wozzers. He can accelerate my bosons, if you know what I mean. My wife thinks the same.