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Related Experiment Video

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Author Spotlight: Deciphering the Cognitive and Neural Mechanisms of Gesture in Communication

Author Spotlight: Deciphering the Cognitive and Neural Mechanisms of Gesture in Communication

Published on: January 26, 2024

Getting to the Point: Examining Associations Between Adult Interactional Strategies and Infant Gestures.

Mollie Romano^1,2, Blair P Lloyd³, Kelsey Lucca⁴

¹School of Communication Science and Disorders, Florida State University, Tallahassee, Florida, USA.

Infancy : the Official Journal of the International Society on Infant Studies

|November 20, 2024

Summary

Adults can boost infant gestures by modeling them with short phrases. This strategy, including pointing, increases the likelihood of infants using gestures, supporting early communication development.

Keywords:

gesture interactional strategy pointing prelinguistic communication sequential analysis

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Area of Science:

Developmental Psychology
Early Childhood Communication
Infant Behavior

Background:

Infant gesture use is crucial for development.
Limited research exists on adult strategies to promote infant gestures.
Understanding adult facilitation can inform early intervention.

Purpose of the Study:

To investigate adult interactional strategies that facilitate infant deictic gestures.
To identify specific adult behaviors associated with increased infant gesturing.
To explore the relationship between these associations, child age, and language development.

Main Methods:

Employed event lag with pauses sequential analysis.
Analyzed 10-minute play interactions between 27 infants (11-25 months) and trained interventionists.
Correlated sequential associations with child age and language scores.

Main Results:

Modeling gestures with short phrases significantly increased the likelihood of infant gestures, especially pointing.
Modeling short phrases without gestures decreased the likelihood of any infant gesture.
Sequential associations showed potential relationships with age and language scores.

Conclusions:

Adults can effectively promote infant gesture use through specific modeling techniques.
Combining gesture modeling with verbalizations is a key strategy for enhancing early communication.
Findings have implications for early intervention programs targeting infant language development.