Multiple studies find that most communication, even in speech, is not the words spoken but expression and similar cues.

Judge as of 2023-09-28, against the state of research then. True: several published studies support the general claim that most human communication, including in spoken interaction, is carried by nonverbal cues (facial expression, tone, gesture) rather than by the words themselves. Mostly true: the studies exist and support it broadly, but with qualifications (for example they apply mainly to emotional or attitude communication). Mixed: the research is genuinely split, with some support and substantial contrary findings. Mostly false: the claim rests on real but narrow findings (for example Mehrabian's 7-38-55 studies on how feelings and attitudes are conveyed through inconsistent messages) stretched into a general rule, or the claim is stated as established when research is inconclusive. False: the research evidence shows the claim is wrong, that words carry most of the information in communication in general.

Set before the research began.

1. E1 Four Misconceptions About Nonverbal Communication PubMed Central (NCBI), academic journal article · 15 February 2023

   “Progress has been hindered, we argue, by presumptions about nonverbal behavior that follow from both received wisdom and faulty evidence.”

2. E2 Mehrabian's communication study Changing Minds (changingminds.org) · 2002

   “It is suggested that the combined effect of simultaneous verbal, vocal and facial attitude communications is a weighted sum of their independent effects -- with the coefficients of .07, .38, and .55, respectively.”

3. E3 BRAIN LESSONS: THE SEVEN PERCENT DELUSION - Advocacy and Evidence Resources Temple University Beasley School of Law, Advocacy and Evidence Resources · 3 May 2021

   “Please note that this and other equations regarding relative importance of verbal and nonverbal messages were derived from experiments dealing with communications of feelings and attitudes (i.e., like-dislike). Unless a communicator is talking about their feelings or attitudes, these equations are not applicable.”

4. E4 Nonverbal communication and social cognition | Health and Medicine | Research Starters | EBSCOhost EBSCO Research Starters · 1 September 2024

   “Estimates suggest that nonverbal cues can account for 60 to 93 percent of the emotional meaning in communication, making them generally more credible than verbal messages.”

Mehrabian's studies are a frequently cited source of figures on this question (E2, E3). They give a weighted model for how feelings and attitudes come across, with coefficients of .07 for words, .38 for voice and .55 for face (E2). A law-school advocacy resource notes that these figures come from experiments on communicating feelings and attitudes, and do not apply when a speaker is not talking about those (E3). Another estimate also covers only emotional meaning, at 60 to 93 percent (E4, dated after the judgment date), and a 2023 academic review argues that progress in the field has been hindered by presumptions drawn from received wisdom and faulty evidence (E1). The evidence therefore points to real but narrow findings stretched into a general rule, which the criteria define as mostly false.