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. 2010 Jun 1;29(2):178-193.
doi: 10.1177/0261927X09359521.

Parkinson's Disease and Politeness

Thomas Holtgraves  1 , Patrick McNamara
Affiliations

Parkinson's Disease and Politeness

Thomas Holtgraves et al. J Lang Soc Psychol. .

Abstract

Prior research suggests that people with Parkinson's disease (PD) display certain deficiencies in their use of language. In this research, the authors used a role-playing technique to examine their ability to say things politely and to vary their level of politeness as a function of the social context. PD participants, relative to control participants, produced less polite strategies and failed to vary their politeness as a function of the size of the request. In addition, PD participants who were on high-dosage levels, relative to control and low-dosage PD participants, did not vary their politeness as a function of the recipient's power. Overall, this research demonstrates a deficit in politeness for people with PD, a deficit that most likely plays a role in some of the social deficits that have been demonstrated to occur for people with PD. Potential neurobiological mechanisms of this deficit are discussed.

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Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Distribution of superstrategies for PD and control participants
Figure 2
Figure 2
Superstrategy distribution for PD and control participants as a function of request size
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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