Abstract Social communication deficits are common across mental-health disorders, yet little is known about how individuals perceive their own gesture behaviours. Gaining insight into this, particularly across different disorders, could enhance our understanding of social communicative impairments and disruptions in self-awareness. The current study included 274 participants: N = 113 with schizophrenia, N = 65 with depression and N = 96 healthy controls where we compared self-reported gesture be