Effects of Scale on Multimodal Deixis: Evidence From Quiahije Chatino

Area of Science:

• Linguistics
• Cognitive Science
• Anthropology

Background:

• Human attention is often guided by spoken demonstratives and gestures like pointing.
• Limited understanding exists on how these cues coordinate attention in natural, large-scale environments.

Purpose of the Study:

• Investigate the use of demonstratives and pointing in Quiahije Chatino for directions across local, district, and state scales.
• Analyze how the interplay of speech and gesture changes with spatial scale.

Main Methods:

• Fieldwork with Quiahije Chatino speakers in Mexico.
• Analysis of demonstrative expressions and pointing behaviors in naturalistic direction-giving contexts.
• Cross-scale comparison of multimodal communication strategies.

Main Results:

• The coordination of demonstratives and pointing varies significantly with the scale of the search space.
• At larger scales, speech and gesture are more likely to co-occur.
• Demonstratives orient attention to the speaker, while pointing refines the search area.

Conclusions:

• Speech and gesture play distinct but complementary roles in guiding attention during navigation.
• The dynamic interplay between verbal and gestural cues is crucial for effective communication in large-scale spaces.
• Findings highlight the nuanced contributions of each modality to a unified linguistic message.