For me, I think it depends on how closely I care about the words or (for fiction at least) whether the scene is people talking or a description of the area or some action.<p>With dialog, or a narrator&#x27;s voice, I often imagine them speaking it or provide a voice for them in my own head. With action scenes, especially engrossing ones, I sort of just spend the extra mental energy trying to picture the scene rather than &quot;hearing&quot; the words. I have a very hard time paying attention to what the characters look like or are wearing. Usually imagine it briefly as it is being described and move on.<p>Oddly enough, when I&#x27;m reading aloud, sometimes I sort of stop imagining what is going on as I&#x27;m too busy trying to sort out how to speak the dialog (especially in some different voices) that I no longer pay complete attention to the scene.<p>For non-fiction, I generally spend more mental energy trying to visualize the concepts being described and stop &quot;hearing&quot; the words. Or if I&#x27;m merely skimming and want to get a sense of what is being said without the details.<p>So I think a &quot;voice&quot; is something I can and do switch on and off depending on whether my brain thinks it is important and probably on the difficulty of the text itself.