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Slip of the tongue: Implications for evolution and language development
Gillian S Forrester1, Alina Rodriguez2
1Department of Psychology, Faculty of Science and Technology, University of Westminster, 115 New Cavendish Street, London, England W1W 6UW, UK.
Cognition
|May 14, 2015
Summary
Language may have evolved from gestures to speech. This study found that young children exhibit right-biased tongue protrusions during precise hand movements, suggesting a link between fine motor skills and vocalization development.
Area of Science:
- Neuroscience
- Developmental Psychology
- Evolutionary Biology
Background:
- A gestural origin for language is a prevailing theory, supported by overlapping neural regions for hand and tongue articulation.
- Behavioral studies show adults exhibit synchronized mouth and hand actions, and right-handedness in children correlates with language development.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the lateralization of tongue protrusions during fine motor tasks in typically developing 4-year-old children.
- To explore the relationship between manual action complexity and associated oral motor behaviors.
Main Methods:
- Utilized a fine-grained behavioral coding paradigm to observe tongue protrusions.
- Assessed children across cognitive tasks involving precision motor action, gross motor action, and no motor action.
Main Results:
- The rate of tongue protrusions was significantly influenced by the motor demands of the task.
- Tongue protrusions were predominantly right-biased exclusively during precision manual motor actions (p<.001).
Conclusions:
- Findings suggest that sympathetic mouth actions, like tongue protrusions, may be lateralized during fine motor tasks.
- This research offers insights into the evolutionary transition from gestural to vocal communication and patterns in child motor development.
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