Needles has observed that gesticulation with the hand may occur at the moment speech breaks down and the patient has the wish to cry or scream. There is a synergy between the mouth and hand already developed by the foetus in utero. Such a mouth-hand synergy is present too when the infant is sucking at the breast and later when the child is learning to speak. With the acquisition of speech the mouth and hand function autonomously, but the mouth-hand linkage is re-established in moments of stress or strong emotional expression. From this point of view, gesticulation accompanying stress or emotion is essentially a form of regression.