Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-7cvxr Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-23T07:56:09.440Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The effects of learning American Sign Language on co-speech gesture*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 January 2012

SHANNON CASEY ,
KAREN EMMOREY  and
HEATHER LARRABEE
SHANNON CASEY*
Affiliation:
San Diego State University Research Foundation
KAREN EMMOREY
Affiliation:
San Diego State University
HEATHER LARRABEE
Affiliation:
San Diego State University Research Foundation
*
Address for correspondence: Shannon Casey, Laboratory for Language and Cognitive Neuroscience, 6495 Alvarado Road, Suite 200, San Diego, CA 92120, USA[email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Given that the linguistic articulators for sign language are also used to produce co-speech gesture, we examined whether one year of academic instruction in American Sign Language (ASL) impacts the rate and nature of gestures produced when speaking English. A survey study revealed that 75% of ASL learners (N = 95), but only 14% of Romance language learners (N = 203), felt that they gestured more after one year of language instruction. A longitudinal study confirmed this perception. Twenty-one ASL learners and 20 Romance language learners (French, Italian, Spanish) were filmed re-telling a cartoon story before and after one academic year of language instruction. Only the ASL learners exhibited an increase in gesture rate, an increase in the production of iconic gestures, and an increase in the number of handshape types exploited in co-speech gesture. Five ASL students also produced at least one ASL sign when re-telling the cartoon. We suggest that learning ASL may (i) lower the neural threshold for co-speech gesture production, (ii) pose a unique challenge for language control, and (iii) have the potential to improve cognitive processes that are linked to gesture.

Keywords

gestureAmerican Sign Languagebilingualism
Type
Research Article
Information
Bilingualism: Language and Cognition , Volume 15 , Issue 4 , October 2012 , pp. 677 - 686
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2012

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

*

This research was supported by NIH Grant R01 HD047736 awarded to Karen Emmorey and San Diego State University. We thank Rachael Colvin for help with gesture coding, and Helsa Borinstein, Kathryn Cooke, Kara Hedlund, Cynthia Kilpatrick, Jeane Kim, Rebecca Obayashi, Danny Perez, Nathan Portugues, Jennie Pyers, Nicole Silverstein, and Robin Thompson for additional help with the study. We also thank the three anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments.

References

Battison, R. (1978). Lexical borrowing in American Sign Language. Silver Spring, MD: Linstok Press.Google Scholar
Boyes-Braem, P. (1990). Acquisition of the handshape in American Sign Language: A preliminary analysis. In Volterra, V. & Erting, C. J. (eds.), From gesture to language in hearing and deaf children, pp. 107–117. New York: Springer Verlag.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Broaders, S. C., Cook, S. W., Mitchell, Z. A., & Goldin-Meadow, S. (2007). Making children gestures brings out implicit knowledge and leads to learning. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 136 (4), 539–550.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Brown, A., & Gullberg, M. (2008). Bidirectional crosslinguistic influence in L1–L2 encoding of manner in speech and gesture: A study of Japanese speakers of English. Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 30 (2), 225–251.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Casey, S., & Emmorey, K. (2009). Co-speech gesture in bimodal bilinguals. Language and Cognitive Processes, 24 (2), 290–312.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Choi, S., & Lantolf, J. P. (2008). Representation and embodiment of meaning in L2 communication: Motion events in the speech and gesture of advanced L2 Korean and L2 English speakers. Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 30 (2), 191–224.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chu, M., & Kita, S. (2008). Spontaneous gestures during mental rotation tasks: Insights into the microdevelopment of the motor strategy. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 137 (4), 706–723.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Chu, M., & Kita, S. (2011). The nature of gestures’ beneficial role in spatial problem solving. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 140 (1), 102–116.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Cook, S. W., Yip, T. K., & Goldin-Meadow, S. (2010). Gesturing makes memories that last. Journal of Memory and Language, 63 (4), 465–475.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Eccarius, P., & Brentari, D. (2007). Symmetry and dominance: A cross-linguistic study of signs and classifier constructions. Lingua, 117, 1169–1201.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Emmorey, K., & Casey, S. (2001). Gesture, thought, and spatial language. Gesture, 1 (1), 35–50.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Emmorey, K., Kosslyn, S. M., & Bellugi, U. (1993). Visual imagery and visual spatial language: Enhanced imagery abilities in deaf and hearing ASL signers. Cognition, 46 (2), 139–181.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Friedman, L. A. (1975). Space, time and person reference in American Sign Language. Language, 51 (4), 940–961.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Goldin-Meadow, S., Cook, S. W., & Mitchell, Z. A. (2009). Gesturing gives children new ideas about math. Psychological Science, 20 (3), 267–272.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Hostetter, A. B., & Alibali, M. W. (2008). Visible embodiment: Gestures as simulated action. Psychonomic Bulletin and Rewiew, 15 (3), 495–514.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kelly, S. D., Barr, D. J., Church, R. B., & Lynch, K. (1999). Offering a hand to pragmatic understanding: The role of speech and gesture in comprehension and memory. Journal of Memory and Language, 40 (4), 577–592.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kendon, A. (1995). Gestures as illocutionary and discourse markers in southern Italian conversation. Journal of Pragmatics, 23, 247–279.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kita, S., & Özyürek, A. (2003). What does cross-linguistic variation in semantic coordination of speech and gesture reveal? Evidence for an interface representation of spatial thinking and speaking. Journal of Memory and Language, 48 (1), 16–32.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Klima, E., & Bellugi, U. (1979). The signs of language. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Krauss, R. (1998). Why do we gesture when we speak? Current Directions in Psychological Science, 7, 54–60.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Liddell, S., & Metzger, M. (1998). Gesture in sign language discourse. Journal of Pragmatics, 30, 657–697.Google Scholar
McNeill, D. (1992). Hand and mind: What gestures reveal about thoughts. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
McNeill, D. (2005). Gesture and thought. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Nagpal, J., Nicoladis, E., & Marentette, P. [F.] (2011). Predicting individual differences in L2 speakers’ gestures. International Journal of Bilingualism, 15 (2), 205–214.Google Scholar
Pika, S., Nicoladis, E., & Marentette, P. F. (2006). A cross-cultural study on the use of gestures: Evidence for cross-linguistic transfer? Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 9 (3), 319–327.Google Scholar
Poggi, I. (2002). Symbolic gestures: The case of the Italian gestionary. Gesture, 2 (1), 71–98.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pyers, J., & Emmorey, K. (2008). The face of bimodal bilingualism: Grammatical markers in ASL are produced when bilinguals speak to English monolinguals. Psychological Science, 19 (6), 531–536.Google Scholar
Talbot, K. F., & Haude, R. H. (1993). The relationship between sign language skill and spatial visualization ability: Mental rotation of three-dimensional objects. Perceptual and Motor Skills, 77, 1387–1391.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Wagner, S. M., Nusbaum, H., & Goldin-Meadow, S. (2004). Probing the mental representation of gesture: Is handwaving spatial? Journal of Memory and Language, 50, 395–407.Google Scholar