Native speakers use subtitles, too!

Photo by Glenn Carstens-Peters on Unsplash

Do you use subtitles to understand TV shows or movies in English? You might be surprised to learn that many native English speakers do, too!

According to a recent poll (linked at the bottom of this article), “One third of the public always or often uses subtitles when watching TV or movies. Adults under 45 are particularly likely to say they regularly watch television or movies with the captions turned on.”

But why? Well, the results show that “Half of those who use subtitles at least any amount do so because they want to catch every word, while 4 in 10 use subtitles to understand accents or watch movies and shows in another language. A third use subtitles because they are in a noisy environment and a quarter do so because of poor audio quality or because they are multi-tasking.”

Yep, native speakers struggle with accents sometimes, too. I remember listening to a comedian from the UK, where there are many regional accents, and catching only about 80% of what he was saying! I had to turn on the subtitles to understand him. In fact, I also turn on the subtitles sometimes to catch little bits of dialogue in the background or sounds that I might not otherwise notice, like a branch snapping or a creepy whisper. One of the most common sounds I see in the subtitles is “whooshing” (a soft sound made by something moving fast through the air).

A lot of people who are learning English say that they want to be able to watch movies and TV shows without using subtitles, but as you can see, even native English speakers use them quite frequently, so don’t worry too much about needing subtitles to understand what you’re watching!

https://apnorc.org/projects/closed-captioning-on-its-a-generational-thing/