Akinetic mutism
brain disease characterized by marked reduction of nearly all motor functions including facial expressions, gestures and speech output, but with some degree of alertness
Akinetic mutism is a medical condition in which patients tend to neither move (akinesia) nor speak (mutism). It is the most severe disorder of diminished motivation. Akinetic mutism was first described in 1941 as a mental state where patients lack the ability to move or speak. However, their eyes may follow their observer or be diverted by sound. Patients lack most motor functions such as speech, facial expressions, and gestures, but demonstrate apparent alertness. They exhibit reduced activity and slowness, and can speak in whispered monosyllables. Patients often show visual fixation on their examiner, move their eyes in response to an auditory stimulus, or move after often repeated commands. Patients with akinetic mutism are not paralyzed, but lack the volition to move. Many patients describe that as soon as they "will" or attempt a movement, a "counter-will" or "resistance" rises up to meet them.
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Akinetic mutism varies across all patients.
“Akinetic mutism” enters the record as brain disease characterized by marked reduction of nearly all motor functions including facial expressions, gestures and speech output, but with some degree of alertness. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Akinetic, mutism and brain can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 6, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q418522. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1941.
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This entry incorporates text from “Akinetic mutism” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.