Objective: to analyze the sense perception of nursing students in the learning of communication in a psychiatric hospital.
Method: qualitative, exploratory and descriptive, from representative drawings of the communication perceived by the body senses of 23 nursing students, and recorded enunciation of the remarkable experiences after the end of the practical activities. The data were analyzed according to thematic content.
Results: the heart captures perceptions, favoring interpersonal relationships; smelling shows care lacking in hospitalization; vision monopolizes the impressions of reality, making the movements static; hearing is exercised in the amplitude to listen; touching demarcates limitations of contact and interaction; and tasting, as social sense, seeks to overcome the obstacles to take care.
Conclusion: the learning of communication was significant, making the psychiatric hospital a space to listen to what is inside, to find in the emotions and rationalities the sensations that can be inside and outside the tension nodes that interfere in the perceptions.