You've probably been told countless times to avoid "like," "um" and "uh" in your speech. But these words may serve more of a linguistic purpose than many of us realize. In this episode, we look at the science behind using these filler words in conversation to find out why they're actually, um, like, normal. And we take a look at how they appear in languages across the world.

Special thanks to James Douglas for taking the time to speak with us for this episode.

For more info about what we discussed in this episode, visit Babbel Magazine: babbel.com/en/magazine/multilinguish-filler-words

Get 50% off a 3-month Babbel subscription by visiting https://www.babbel.com/coupons/new and using the code MULTI.