'Depictions' play key role in human communication but they're often overlooked, new Stanford research shows

When talking with others, people routinely describe and point at things, but they also depict things with their hands, arms, head, face, eyes and body – with and without props.

Yet this action of “depicting” or “staging a scene” non-verbally is little understood in the academic world, according to a new study by Herbert Clark, a Stanford cognitive psychologist.