{"title":"Do gestures reflect children’s lexical retrieval difficulties?","authors":"Elena Nicoladis, Emma Hill","doi":"10.1075/gest.23001.nic","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"\n According to the Lexical Retrieval Hypothesis, one important function of representational gestures is to help\n speakers retrieve words for production. In this study, we test whether gestures help preschoolers access words for production. We\n tested two predictions generated from the LRH. First, since bilinguals often have greater difficulties with lexical access than\n monolinguals, we predicted that bilinguals will gesture more than monolinguals. Second, since low-frequency words are harder to\n access than high frequency words, we predicted that the more low-frequency words children used, the more they would gesture. Using\n children’s (aged 4 to 6 years) data from a storytelling task, we found no difference in gesture use between bilinguals and\n monolinguals. We did, however, find that the use of low-frequency words was a positive predictor of gesture use. While this result\n could support the LRH, an exploration of some examples of gesture production raises some doubts about that conclusion.","PeriodicalId":35125,"journal":{"name":"Gesture","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.7000,"publicationDate":"2024-03-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Gesture","FirstCategoryId":"98","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1075/gest.23001.nic","RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"0","JCRName":"LANGUAGE & LINGUISTICS","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
According to the Lexical Retrieval Hypothesis, one important function of representational gestures is to help
speakers retrieve words for production. In this study, we test whether gestures help preschoolers access words for production. We
tested two predictions generated from the LRH. First, since bilinguals often have greater difficulties with lexical access than
monolinguals, we predicted that bilinguals will gesture more than monolinguals. Second, since low-frequency words are harder to
access than high frequency words, we predicted that the more low-frequency words children used, the more they would gesture. Using
children’s (aged 4 to 6 years) data from a storytelling task, we found no difference in gesture use between bilinguals and
monolinguals. We did, however, find that the use of low-frequency words was a positive predictor of gesture use. While this result
could support the LRH, an exploration of some examples of gesture production raises some doubts about that conclusion.
期刊介绍:
Gesture publishes articles reporting original research, as well as survey and review articles, on all aspects of gesture. The journal aims to stimulate and facilitate scholarly communication between the different disciplines within which work on gesture is conducted. For this reason papers written in the spirit of cooperation between disciplines are especially encouraged. Topics may include, but are by no means limited to: the relationship between gesture and speech; the role gesture may play in communication in all the circumstances of social interaction, including conversations, the work-place or instructional settings; gesture and cognition; the development of gesture in children.