Speaking with Hands

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How Do you Gesticulate...? If at all. Gesticulation activates cerebellum, its a very primordial function. But not everybody is overly animated. Do you speak with gestures?

I do sometimes, if I'm, hyper, over excited, stimulated. But I suppose most of the time I don't really' illustrate a point' I just Speak , with minimal movement, but then again thats my perception, I find it hard to monitor myself , its all unconscious, fleeting , and subtle. Is this natural to NT, and learned behavior for others?

I only tend to use my hands to illustrate shapes or motions I have in mind. However, I have great success at using my head to indicate directions when carrying things with strangers. In Toronto, drivers understood that a punch toward a car's headlight, ending with suddenly splayed fingers meant "Turn on your lights," but people in other places seldom did.

I use my hands quite excessively when I'm talking, but I think it's a form of hyperactivity. Like if I'm talking about a pair of shoes I bought, I touch my feet as I'm saying it. If I'm trying to explain my point I move my hands a lot. I can't seem to not do it so I think it's subconscious.

I used to do it a lot but I kept being told off by others. It was more a form of stimming to be honest. They called me "Golum" where I first worked because of the way I moved my hands when I spoke.
My niece did not speak until she was around five but she could gesture with her hands and her head so well that one would not even notice that she had not used her voice.She is very intelligent.

I don't gesture much unless i am imitating Others. Its not innate to me.

I don't think I gestured a whole bunch as a child, but I eventually learned to and now I do it a lot. It makes people understand me a lot better, though is exhausting to keep track of and execute while socializing.

I don't gesture very much at all. I have a flat affect and few facial expressions. I might use my hands if I'm really excited and comfortable with the person, but it's more like stimming (waving madly) than actually making gestures with meaning.

I had a stroke in my cerebellum so I think that makes it even worse.

Oh, plus the mutism.

I don't at all. As far as I can tell I don't move my hands or arms at all when talking. They're typically pocketed. I feel quite strange thinking about that fact, and seeing the results of the poll. I'm inclined to think that it has something to do with a life-long reluctance and felt inability to express myself. I think i might have had (or still have) selective mutism or something.

That said, I can't recall any of my family doing it either so I wonder if it is a learned behaviour... or both learned and natural. I think I'm the same as you in regards to monitoring myself, so I'm now wondering if I also don't notice others gesticulating. Maybe my family actually do gesticulate and it just occupies a void in my conscious attention.

Paul McCready, glider champion and tech pioneer, was described as the only pilot in the world who could talk about flying with his hands in his pockets.

I think as a child I never gesticulated much. Since then I have learned to, by copying others. I even have some gestures I can recognize as coming from a particular person. I now use my hands a lot. I think it helps me find the words to say what I want to somehow. It seems to help with formulating a sentence. I am often "winging it" in conversation. Making it up as I go along starting from a vague idea of what I want to say. The hand movements almost shape that process somehow.

Moving my body has always been kind of a stim for me, so it's only a matter of course that I'm expressive with body language. I've also always been very active with my hands since as long as I can remember. Plenty of sports and hobbies that made big use of my hands.

It's also been a kind of defense mechanism, too. Being expressively honest with feelings of aggression had been necessary to defend myself from aggressors.

I can also sometimes be more subtle in my body language at times. Still, I probably trend towards being more expressive than subtle with my hands. My mind is strongly geared towards spatial cognition, so using my hands to demonstrate spatial concepts helps me to communicate meaning.

I tend to gesticulate for emphasis or to express an intense emotion (such as excitement or anger).

Generally I tend to be quite rigid in movement, except around people I am really close to. If I'm comfortable around you, then I gesticulate a lot more. Especially if we're talking about something entertaining that I'm really into, then I become quite animated. My self-consciousness prevents me from being as expressive as I'd usually be otherwise.

My hands just do what they want when I am talking...lol.

Sometimes I may make movements to empathize something or this or that, but I a lot of it is just random and I am not even totally aware I'm doing it.

Option D. Too unware to notice.

Yes, alot of it goes unnoticed, thats why i think i underestimate my own gesturing. But its context dependent. It takes no effort to mean mug a person, and act like you're made of stone. I gesture when enthusiastic. I guess im just hard to enthuse. Unless you're in a coma thought you're not too unawares. I wonder who the 2 robots are.