Gesture-Speech Mismatches

Gesture-speech mismatches occur when the physical gestures that accompany verbal communication convey different information than what is actually being said. Humans use physical gestures to accompany verbal communication.

The Broca's and Wernicke's areas of the brain are responsible for gesturing and it is suggested that physical nonverbal communication was a precursor to spoken language in humans.

Mismatches between communicative physical gestures and speech are common in children when they are explaining a concept like how to solve a math problem.