The nurse puts his arm around an older adult client when assisting her

QUESTION

The nurse puts his arm around an older adult client when assisting her to transfer to a chair. The client could interpret the nurse’s touch as

a. a positive gesture only.
b. a threat.
c. denotation.
d. paralanguage.

ANSWER:

ANS: A
Touching a client is one of the most powerful ways a nurse has to communicate nonverbally. Within a professional relationship, affective touch can convey caring and reassurance. In studies, nurses’ touching clients has been reported to be perceived both positively as an expression of caring and negatively as a threat. Denotation refers to the generalized meaning of a word. Paralanguage is the way a verbal message is expressed.