Okay, maybe it's not entirely true, but there's no denying that when we hear our own voice in a recording, regardless of the device or software, the first thing that comes to mind is "that's not me," and we try to reject the association. The big question is why, but the fact is there's more than one answer. One reason has to do with our own body, another falls into the psychological realm, and why not, even the philosophical.
The first time I heard my own voice recorded on tape (yes, a cassette, I'm that old) it was very, very strange. At first I was convinced something was wrong with the recording, but the rest of the people present confirmed that this was indeed my voice. Even today, when I send a voice message via WhatsApp, there's an invisible barrier between the voice coming out of the smartphone's speaker and the way I heard myself when recording it. Probably the most interesting aspect is that this happens to most people. Several journalists have admitted it on social media, to the extent that some consider the way their recorded voices sound 'intolerable.' So, what's going on?
The Physical Reason: Bone Conduction
The first reason is in our heads... the skull, to be more precise. In a very simplified version, sound travels through the air, enters our ear canals, vibrates the eardrums, continues to the cochlea, and finally our brain interprets it. However, when we hear ourselves, a new element appears in the equation: the so-called 'bone conduction.' Bone conduction transmits lower frequencies, which are also registered by the cochlea, and so we arrive at the difference between our real recorded voice and the 'modified version' we know. But there's something more... isn't there?
The Psychological Factor
I'm sure several philosophers would return from the dead to throw me on the pyre for trying to simplify this (they're warned, I'll put up a fight), but there's a way in which you experience yourself. That 'editing' of yourself is what you believe you share with the world, and what you expect the world to see. The rejection of our recorded voice, or a photograph in which we look very different (younger, fatter, thinner, uglier, more beautiful, etc.), represents in a way the breaking of that belief, the obligation for those annoying few seconds to change perspective, and the discovery that things are not what they seem, even within ourselves.
