title: The Development of the Ability to Semantically Integrate Information in Speech and Iconic Gesture in Comprehension.
abstract: We examined whether children's ability to integrate speech and gesture follows the pattern of a broader developmental shift between 3- and 5-year-old children (Ramscar & Gitcho, 2007) regarding the ability to process two pieces of information simultaneously. In Experiment 1, 3-year-olds, 5-year-olds, and adults were presented with either an iconic gesture or a spoken sentence or a combination of the two on a computer screen, and they were instructed to select a photograph that best matched the message. The 3-year-olds did not integrate information in speech and gesture, but 5-year-olds and adults did. In Experiment 2, 3-year-old children were presented with the same speech and gesture as in Experiment 1 that were produced live by an experimenter. When presented live, 3-year-olds could integrate speech and gesture. We concluded that development of the integration ability is a part of the broader developmental shift; however, live-presentation facilitates the nascent integration ability in 3-year-olds.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Warwick.
authors.forename: Kazuki
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Sekine
authors.affiliation: Department of English Language and Communication, Kingston University.
authors.forename: Hannah
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Sowden
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Warwick.
authors.forename: Sotaro
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Kita
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D002675:Child, Preschool; D032882:Comprehension; D005260:Female; D005868:Gestures; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D010775:Photic Stimulation; D012660:Semantics; D013067:Speech Perception; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Gesture; Multimodal communication; Preschool children; Semantics; Speech