5 minutes 29 · October 2009
The 4 ways sound affects us
Sound works on us physiologically, psychologically, cognitively and behaviourally, all the time, and mostly below conscious awareness. This is where the whole argument starts.
TED
Five TED talks, seen an estimated 170 million times.
Five TED talks and 10 TEDx talks, 15 in all, which makes me one of the five most-viewed TED speakers of all time. How to speak so that people want to listen is the sixth most-viewed TED talk of all time.
They were given over five years, and read in order they're one long argument: sound does this to us, so listen better, so design better, so speak better.
The talks, in order
6 minutes 57 · September 2010
Shh! Sound health in 8 steps
An increasingly noisy world is eating away at our health, and at our mental health in particular. Eight practical steps to take some of it back.
7 minutes 33 · July 2011
5 ways to listen better
We are losing our listening. Five exercises to get it back, and the talk that turned listening into something people practise rather than assume.
9 minutes 34 · September 2012
Why architects need to use their ears
Children in badly designed classrooms miss half of what their teachers say, and patients in hospitals can't sleep. We design for the eyes and forget the ears.
9 minutes 44 · June 2014
How to speak so that people want to listen
The seven habits that lose an audience, the four cornerstones of powerful speech, and the voice as an instrument. The sixth most-viewed TED talk of all time.
About the numbers
The 170 million figure is an estimate of total reach across all platforms, which is why the word estimated always travels with it. The validated floor, counted directly from TED.com plays and the official TED YouTube channel, is over 140 million.
Ten TEDx talks sit alongside the five, given at events from Athens to the Houses of Parliament, and there's a TEDMED talk as well, plus a TED session I guest-curated.
If the talks were useful
The app Master Conscious Communication turns all of this into daily practice, and The Listening Society is where the courses and the community live. If you want the talks live, with your own audience in the room, the speaking page is the place to start.