How to get to the cafeteria: gesture and speech in blind and sighted children's spatial descriptions

This study evaluated the production and informational content of gesture and speech in congenitally blind and sighted children to assess hypothesized variations in children's representations of spatial tasks. Twelve congenitally blind participants (ages 9-18 years) and 24 sighted participants (ages 9-17 years: 12 of whom wore blindfolds) engaged in route directions and small-scale path description tasks. Whereas sighted and blindfolded participants gestured extensively in both tasks, a majority of blind children gestured only in the small-scale path description task. Absence of gesture among blind participants was related to use of a "segmenting strategy" in speech that was rarely observed among sighted children. There was also evidence that among blind and sighted children who gestured, information about direction and location was more likely to be conveyed in gesture than in speech. Results are discussed in terms of the link between gesture production and spatial task representations and factors affecting gesture production.