Gesture and Language Lab [GaLL]

"As the tongue speaketh to the ear, so the gesture speaketh to the eye" (Bacon, 1891)

The major objective of this Lab is to explore and to clarify the nature and the role of gesture in the progression from action to language in children with typical and atypical development.

The two main hypothesis are that there is a continuity between an earlier 'preverbal' and a later functionally 'equivalent' linguistic form and that the use of gesture is a robust developmental phenomenon, exhibiting similar features across different children and cultures. Language is considered a gesture-speech integrated system, and the output systems of speech and gesture may draw on underlying brain mechanisms common to both language and motor functions.

While we now know a great deal about the development of language and gesture in normally-developing children studied within specific linguistic contexts, we are only beginning to understand the influence of linguistic and cultural variation on early gesture use, the nature and development of gesture in children with atypical patterns of language and cognitive development, and the role of parental input in the development of gesture and speech. Our current effort is focused on three major questions:

1. To what extent are there cross-linguistic and cross-cultural differences in gestural and verbal communication in the early stages of communicative development?
2. Are different profiles of language impairment accompanied by different patterns of gesture production? Or is there a general pattern of disruption in gesture production that emerges in children with comparable cognitive delays, regardless of their specific pattern of language impairment?
3. To what extent does parental production of gesture and speech vary in relation to the child's cognitive status, developmental level, and language ability?