Susan Goldin-Meadow

Blind adults display language‐specificity in their packaging and ordering of events in speech. These differences affect the representation of events in co‐speech gesture––gesturing with speech––but not in silent gesture––gesturing without speech. Here we examine when in development blind children begin to show adult‐like patterns in co‐speech and silent gesture. We studied speech and gestures produced by 30 blind and 30 sighted children learning Turkish, equally divided into 3 age groups: 5–6, 7–8, 9–10 years. The children were asked to describe three‐dimensional spatial event scenes (e.g., running out of a house) first with speech, and then without speech using only their hands. We focused on physical motion events, which, in blind adults, elicit cross‐linguistic differences in speech and co‐speech gesture, but cross‐linguistic similarities in silent gesture. Our results showed an effect of language on …

Adults display cross-linguistic variability in their speech in how they package and order semantic elements of a motion event. These differences can also be found in speakers’ co-speech gestures (gesturing with speech), but not in their silent gestures (gesturing without speech). Here, we examine when in development children show the differences between co-speech gesture and silent gesture found in adults. We studied speech and gestures produced by 100 children learning English or Turkish (n = 50/language) – equally divided into 5 age-groups: 3–4, 5–6, 7–8, 9–10, and 11–12 years. Children were asked to describe three-dimensional spatial event scenes (e.g., a figure crawling across carpet) first with speech and then without speech using their hands. We focused on physical motion events that elicit, in adults, cross-linguistic differences in co-speech gesture and cross-linguistic similarities in silent gesture …

One structural dimension that varies across languages is the simultaneous or sequential expression of meaning. Complex predicates can layer meanings together simultaneously in a single-verb predicate (SVP) or distribute them sequentially in a multiple-verb predicate (MVP). We ask whether typological variability in this dimension might be a consequence of systematic patterns of diachronic change. We examine the distribution of markers of agency and number within the verb phrase (the predicate) in the earliest stages of a young, emerging sign language in Nicaragua, Lengua de Señas Nicaragüense (LSN), beginning with homesign systems like those from which LSN originated, and progressing through two decades of transmission to new learners. We find that: (i) LSN2 signers are more likely to produce MVPs than homesigners or LSN1 signers; (ii) in the MVPs they do produce, homesigners and LSN1 signers are more likely to produce predicates that mark both agency and number simultaneously on at least one of the verbs; LSN2 signers are just as likely to produce sequences with verbs that mark agency and number in sequentially separate verbs. We discuss how language acquisition, modality, and structure, as well as specific social factors associated with each of the groups, play a role in driving these changes, and how, over time, these patterns of change might yield the diversity of forms observed across spoken and signed languages today.

The valid assessment of vocabulary development in dual‐language‐learning infants is critical to developmental science. We developed the Dual Language Learners English‐Spanish (DLL‐ES) Inventories to measure vocabularies of U.S. English‐Spanish DLLs. The inventories provide translation equivalents for all Spanish and English items on Communicative Development Inventory (CDI) short forms; extended inventories based on CDI long forms; and Spanish language‐variety options. Item‐Response Theory analyses applied to Wordbank and Web‐CDI data (n = 2603, 12–18 months; n = 6722, 16–36 months; half female; 1% Asian, 3% Black, 2% Hispanic, 30% White, 64% unknown) showed near‐perfect associations between DLL‐ES and CDI long‐form scores. Interviews with 10 Hispanic mothers of 18‐ to 24‐month‐olds (2 White, 1 Black, 7 multi‐racial; 6 female) provide a proof of concept for the value of …

How do learners learn what no and not mean when they are only presented with what is? Given its complexity, abstractness, and roles in logic, truth-functional negation might be a conceptual accomplishment. As a result, young children’s gradual acquisition of negation words might be due to their undergoing a gradual conceptual change that is necessary to represent those words’ logical meaning. However, it’s also possible that linguistic expressions of negation take time to learn because of children’s gradually increasing grasp of their language. To understand what no and not mean, children might first need to understand the rest of the sentences in which those words are used. We provide experimental evidence that conceptually equipped learners (adults) face the same acquisition challenges that children do when their access to linguistic information is restricted, which simulates how much language children …

Communication is a critical skill in development—it allows children to convey the contents of their minds, and gain access to the thoughts of those around them. When we think of early communication, we may think mostly of children's first words. But, in fact, early communication is led not by the mouth, but by the hands. We gesture from early in development and throughout the lifespan. For instance, babies point to objects they want a parent to see, school-aged children use their hands to describe their reasoning about complex concepts such as conservation or mathematical equivalence, and adults use gestures when talking to each other, when talking to their children, and even when they are by themselves thinking through a problem. Most incredibly from a developmental perspective, gestures lead the way in communicative and language development, and tie specifically to cognitive advancements. In this chapter, we discuss the role of gestures as they contribute to developmental outcomes. We begin by reviewing how children gain the ability to both produce and comprehend gestures, and then discuss how gesture is linked to communicative development more broadly. We then discuss how gesture, combined with language, has the unique ability to shed light on cognitive advancements, both by providing a window onto children's conceptual state and also by playing a functional role in the learning process itself. Next, we review the role of gesture in cases of atypical development, outline how gesture can be used as a diagnostic tool and discuss its potential in intervention. We emphasize the benefit of considering gesture as part of …

Laboratory studies have demonstrated beneficial effects of making comparisons on children’s analogical reasoning skills. We extend this finding to an observational dataset comprising 42 children. The prevalence of specific comparisons, which identify a feature of similarity or difference, in children’s spontaneous speech from 14–58 months is associated with higher scores in tests of verbal and non-verbal analogy in 6th grade. We test two pre-registered hypotheses about how parents influence children’s production of specific comparisons: 1) via modelling, where parents produce specific comparisons during the sessions prior to child onset of this behaviour; 2) via responsiveness, where parents respond to their children’s earliest specific comparisons in variably engaged ways. We do not find that parent modelling or responsiveness predicts children’s production of specific comparisons. However, one of our …

An astounding account of how gesture, long overlooked, is essential to how we learn and interact, which “changes the way you think about yourself and the people around you.”(Ethan Kross, bestselling author of Chatter) We all know people who talk with their hands—but do they know what they’re saying with them? Our gestures can reveal and contradict us, and express thoughts we may not even know we’re thinking. In Thinking with Your Hands, esteemed cognitive psychologist Susan Goldin-Meadow argues that gesture is vital to how we think, learn, and communicate. She shows us, for instance, how the height of our gestures can reveal unconscious bias, or how the shape of a student’s gestures can track their mastery of a new concept—even when they’re still giving wrong answers. She compels us to rethink everything from how we set child development milestones, to what’s admissible in a court of law, to whether Zoom is an adequate substitute for in-person conversation. Sweeping and ambitious, Thinking with Your Hands promises to transform the way we think about language and communication.