Non-verbal behavior in people with parkinson’s disease as a possibility of improvement of communication

Abstract

We propose the analysis of some behavioral issues which affect communication in people with Parkinson’s Disease (PD) relative to their environment in order to develop a proposal of communication based on the framework of a relational anthropology. A bibliographical review was developed, along with a theoretical proposal. Behavior is understood as a co-constructive relationship between the individual and their environment, while communication is seen as a condition of this relationship. Several advances and opinions about gestuality and non-verbal behavior in people with PD are reviewed from the perspectives which emphasize both the deficit as a non-motor sign of Parkinson and compensatory strategies. Taking as a theoretical framework the relational point of view of human behavior, this article puts forward a co-constructive approach of non-verbal behavior in people with PD, which promotes the idea of health in the context of a chronic illness through the same possibilities that the characteristics of behavior offer, primarily through the phenomenon of paradoxical kinesia.