A question: What is the psychology of people who refer to themselves in the 3rd person? nt

[ChisolmTrailDem]

[tymorial]

1. It depends on the situation and context

But generally, narcissism.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

2. Weirdness? Depends on the situation, I guess.

I recall that Bob Dole did that a lot, and got teased about it.

[Trust Buster]

3. A greater degree of narcissism.

[JHB]

4. Only seen one guy who could do it and make it work. He was fictional.

[DawgHouse]

13. Homey the Clown made it work.

Homey don't play that.

[MADem]

5. A very good article on the topic.

http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-33943762

The technical term for it is illeism from "ille", the Latin for "he", and history provides many examples, from Julius Caesar - who wrote a history of his Gallic campaigns as if he were an objective observer rather than a protagonist - to Charles de Gaulle and Richard Nixon, basketball megastar Le Bron James and Mikhail Gorbachev. In Gorbachev's case it was one of the linguistic habits that led his rival, Yegor Ligachev, to say he was behaving like an "enlightened monarch".

Toddlers are often illeists, before they fully grasp the use of "I" and "me", so fictional characters portrayed as young children or simple-minded adults sometimes speak like this. Examples include Sesame Street's Elmo and Jimmy from the sitcom, Seinfeld....

[cali]

8. So are mothers and fathers of toddlers

[cali]

6. It depends. Obviously.

[womanofthehills]

7. Trump does this all the time

Why the F%$# Do People Refer to Themselves in the Third Person?
Esquire magazine is going to discuss the proper use of the third person, and Esquire magazine doesn't think you're going to have a problem with that.


Major Human Flaw: Some people refer to themselves in the third person.

Response No. 1, by Elsa Ronningstam, associate clinical professor of psychology at Harvard Medical School and author of Identifying and Understanding the Narcissistic Personality: Referring to yourself in the third person creates distance between "I" and "he." So if you have an exaggerated view of how great you are, you could be using this distance to make yourself even bigger. Or, if you've achieved major success suddenly, using the third person could be a way to adjust to the bigger role that's been assigned to you. It's a way to enlarge yourself to fit that role.

Response No. 2, by Mike Birbiglia, stand-up comedian who currently stars in the off-Broadway show Sleepwalk with Me: People love to rip those who refer to themselves in the third person, but they don't understand the power that comes with it. The third person is how you indicate that the topic is not open for debate. You are speaking about facts that just so happen to include you. Like when Alonzo Mourning says, "Alonzo Mourning has to make the best business decisions for Alonzo Mourning," everyone steps back a little, and somebody hands him $15 million a year for seven years. But that same sentence in the first person would have sounded like, "I just enjoy playing basketball with my friends and all the free Gatorade." See the difference? Maybe this is a case of what the f%$# is right with these people....

http://www.esquire.com/news-politics/a5036/third-person-1108/

[Ilsa]

9. I knew someone who would occasionally do this.

He didn't seem narcissistic, and in fact was fairly humble and realistic in his abilities. It was as if he was trying to look at a personal situation, and try to get the listener to do the same, from a more objective perspective, although I'm not sure how that worked out.

[womanofthehills]

10. Trump does this in his tweets

[Downwinder]

11. Irish?

[IDemo]

12. We will check Wiki and get back to you on that n/t