Nonverbal synchrony in psychopathology: A review

Identifying objective and implicit markers of psychopathology is important and can facilitate accurate diagnosis of psychiatric disorders. The present study reviews evidence of one such potential marker - nonverbal synchrony. Nonverbal synchrony reflects the correlation between individuals' movements during an interaction and can be measured objectively using motion energy analysis. In our review, we found studies on nonverbal synchrony among individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), schizophrenia, major depressive disorder (MDD), social anxiety disorder (SAD), and borderline personality disorder (BPD). As nonverbal synchrony was associated with diverse variables among individuals with diverse disorders, we systematically reviewed the findings for each disorder separately to describe the state of the evidence in the field. We found that nonverbal synchrony was lower among individuals with psychopathology. We also found unique patterns associated with specific disorders: low nonverbal synchrony and normal levels of movement were associated with ASD, low nonverbal synchrony and low levels of movement were associated with schizophrenia, patterns of over- and under-synchrony depending on context were associated with SAD. Implication for diagnosis and treatment of psychiatric disorders are discussed.