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What Is The Definition Of Nonverbal Communication?

A journalist recently asked me, “As a body language expert can you tell me what is Nonverbal Communication?”
What does nonverbal communication include and what doesn’t it include?
How do you define Nonverbal Communication?
Here is the list of cues and behaviors under each separate category of nonverbal communication.
Kinesics – body movement and placement, including gesture, leaning, facial expressions
Paralanguage - voice quality, rate, pitch, volume, and speaking style
Prosodics - features such as rhythm, intonation and stress
Vocalics - vocalizations other than words, such as sighs and moans
Haptics - touch
Proxemics - spatial distances
Chronemics -time
Olfactics - smell, pheromones
Artifacts - use of objects such as cell phones, purses and cigarettes
Technics - A label I have given to the nonverbal aspects of written texts, and electronic communication font choice, handwriting style, spatial arrangement of words, length of text, physical layout of a page and the timing of messages.


Patti Wood, MA, Certified Speaking Professional - The Body Language Expert. For more body language insights go to her website at http://PattiWood.net. Also check out the body language quiz on her YouTube Channel at http://youtube.com/user/bodylanguageexpert.