It seems to have a lot of positive press, and it works for me--though I'm cautious of talking to myself at work before knowing if it would come across negatively.
I learned to do my self talk in writing. I just switch to Emacs and start typing (either in my project "notebook", general "mind dump" file, or a throwaway buffer).
These days I actually feel I'm worse at talking to myself in my head than I am in talking to myself via a keyboard.
I don't buy the whole "if you hear it you'll see it" thing for coding - unless you're used to saying things you're working on I guess, but I'm not. I can see the extra focus it could bring because you're spending more effort in vocalizing your thoughts and it's going trough different systems as well (physically hearing yourself speak).
I've tried both and you can talk yourself trough the problem inside of your head step by step just as effectively when it comes to coding tasks IMO.
Immediate problem solving/planning like "OK I need to do this then this" is a different story - saying stuff out loud helps here.
It seems to have a lot of positive press, and it works for me--though I'm cautious of talking to myself at work before knowing if it would come across negatively.