Stanley Grand

SELF-TOUCHING, PERFORMANCE, AND ATTENTIONAL PROCESSES

Previous observations in our laboratory suggested that self-touching, the continuous movements of the hands on the body or onto each other, would increase during periods of attentional disruption or interference. The present study explored this notion further by testing whether or not variation in self-touching is associated with variation in performance in three different experimental tasks. The results indicate that certain types of continuous self-touching are consistently and significantly associated with three different performance measures. Since performance in a task is usually viewed as involving attentional processes, the present findings suggest a link between activity of hands and variations in the effective deployment of attention.

On Hand Movements During Speech: Studies of the Role of Self-Stimulation in Communication under Conditions of Psychopathology, Sensory Deficit, and Bilingualism

I would like to describe a particular line of research which I and my colleagues at the Clinical Behavior Research Unit have been engaged in over the past few years. This research has been concerned with hand movements accompanying the speech of those who, for various reasons, experience disruptions in their communicative contact with others. These studies have been conducted within the context of a larger research program which aims at understanding the function of kinesic behavior during speech. A basic assumption underlying this program has been that hand movements which accompany speech, quite apart from their intrinsic communicative value for the listener, play an important supportive and regulating role in the organization and coding of thought for the speaker himself. Our focus upon those who experience disruption in communicative contact was chosen as a way of testing this assumption.

Prologue: A Gesture Toward a Psychoanalytic Theory of Communication

Twenty years ago, Rene Spitz (1957) published what we deem to be a monumental monograph—“No and Yes.” We single out this work because Spitz may be regarded as the spiritual father of this volume. His was the first gesture in the direction of a psychoanalytic view of communication. Moreover, his work was buttressed by relatively hard data and was developmental in conception. Although we have a psychoanalytic theory of thinking, of drives, and of object relations, we do not possess a psychoanalytic theory of communication. This is remarkable in a discipline that rests heavily on the discourse between people. If this volume can make a fresh beginning in defining those principles which govern the symbolic commerce between people, our efforts will have been worthwhile.