Gesture reflects language development: Evidence from bilingual children

Citation
Ri. Mayberry et E. Nicoladis, Gesture reflects language development: Evidence from bilingual children, CUR DIR PSY, 9(6), 2000, pp. 192-196
Citations number
15
Categorie Soggetti
Psycology
Journal title
CURRENT DIRECTIONS IN PSYCHOLOGICAL SCIENCE
ISSN journal
09637214 → ACNP
Volume
9
Issue
6
Year of publication
2000
Pages
192 - 196
Database
ISI
SICI code
0963-7214(200012)9:6<192:GRLDEF>2.0.ZU;2-Z
Abstract
There is a growing awareness that language and gesture are deeply intertwin ed in the spontaneous expression of adults. Although some research suggests that children use gesture independently of speech, there is scant research on how language and gesture develop in children older than 2 years. We rep ort here on a longitudinal investigation of the relation between gesture an d language development in French-English bilingual children from 2 to 3 1/2 years old. The specific gesture types of iconics and beats correlated with the development of the children's two languages, whereas pointing types of gestures generally did not. The onset of iconic and beat gestures coincide d with the onset of sentencelike utterance separately in each of the childr en's two languages. The findings show that gesture is related to language d evelopment rather than being independent from it. Contrasting theories abou t how gesture is related to language development are discussed.