Fortunately, one 2014 paper tangentially addresses the question. Ethan Kross, who examines self-talk at the University of Michigan, concluded while studying pronoun use (or lack thereof) among anxious people, that speaking in the third person conveys confidence and helps people deal with stressful situations. Kross found that when he asked even non-stressed study participants to speak in the third person, they consistently spoke with more confidence than those who were instructed to speak in the first person.¶¶In 2017, Kross and colleagues confirmed this suspicion with fMRI brain scans demonstrating the manner in which people exert cognitive control over their emotions when speaking in the third person.