title: Embodied communication: speakers' gestures affect listeners' actions.
abstract: We explored how speakers and listeners use hand gestures as a source of perceptual-motor information during naturalistic communication. After solving the Tower of Hanoi task either with real objects or on a computer, speakers explained the task to listeners. Speakers' hand gestures, but not their speech, reflected properties of the particular objects and the actions that they had previously used to solve the task. Speakers who solved the problem with real objects used more grasping handshapes and produced more curved trajectories during the explanation. Listeners who observed explanations from speakers who had previously solved the problem with real objects subsequently treated computer objects more like real objects; their mouse trajectories revealed that they lifted the objects in conjunction with moving them sideways, and this behavior was related to the particular gestures that were observed. These findings demonstrate that hand gestures are a reliable source of perceptual-motor information during human communication.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, The University of Iowa, E11 Seashore Hall, Iowa City, IA 52242, USA. susan-cook@uiowa.edu
authors.forename: Susan Wagner
authors.initials: SW
authors.lastname: Cook
authors.forename: Michael K
authors.initials: MK
authors.lastname: Tanenhaus
mesh_terms: D000161:Acoustic Stimulation; D000328:Adult; D003071:Cognition / Q000502:physiology; D005868:Gestures; D006801:Humans; D011340:Problem Solving / Q000502:physiology*; D011597:Psychomotor Performance / Q000502:physiology*; D013060:Speech / Q000502:physiology*; D013067:Speech Perception / Q000502:physiology*
references.citation: Psychol Sci. 2002 Mar;13(2):168-71
references.pmid: 11934002
references.citation: J Exp Psychol Hum Percept Perform. 1995 Apr;21(2):334-43
references.pmid: 7714475
references.citation: J Exp Psychol Hum Percept Perform. 1981 Aug;7(4):733-40
references.pmid: 6457088
references.citation: Brain Lang. 2004 Apr;89(1):253-60
references.pmid: 15010257
references.citation: J Cogn Neurosci. 2007 Apr;19(4):605-16
references.pmid: 17381252
references.citation: Cognition. 2010 Jun;115(3):380-93
references.pmid: 20356575
references.citation: Psychon Bull Rev. 2002 Sep;9(3):558-65
references.pmid: 12412897
references.citation: Dev Psychol. 2003 May;39(3):509-20
references.pmid: 12760519
references.citation: J Exp Psychol Learn Mem Cogn. 1989 Nov;15(6):1047-60
references.pmid: 2530305
references.citation: Exp Brain Res. 2004 Jan;154(1):103-8
references.pmid: 14578997
references.citation: Psychon Bull Rev. 2008 Jun;15(3):495-514
references.pmid: 18567247
references.citation: Psychophysiology. 2005 Nov;42(6):654-67
references.pmid: 16364061
references.citation: Cognition. 2005 Jan;94(3):B79-89
references.pmid: 15617669
references.citation: Q J Exp Psychol A. 2002 Apr;55(2):593-607
references.pmid: 12047061
references.citation: Brain Lang. 2004 Apr;89(1):27-37
references.pmid: 15010234
references.citation: Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2005 Jul 19;102(29):10393-8
references.pmid: 15985550
references.citation: J Cogn Neurosci. 2007 Jul;19(7):1175-92
references.pmid: 17583993