Developing communication through objects: Ostensive gestures as the first gestures in children's development

A Genealogy of Gestures: On the Nature and Emergence of Forms of Gestural Communication within Shared Routines

“…From Holding Objects to Showing and Giving Gestures Although less evidence has been brought to light about proximal gesture development (Guevara & Rodríguez, 2023), showing and giving gestures could also be considered within this family of gestures. Regarding showing gestures, parents not only provide objects for their young children but tend to comment or act on the objects their children are already holding or using.…”

“…However, we argue that imitation is neither the beginning nor the end of this process because children are selective and do not imitate everything that adults do. Hay & Murray (1982) suggest that for 12-month-old infants, "the modeling of a social action alone, without explicit prompts for imitation and/or a game-like pacing of modeled events, may not be sufficient to induce infants to perform that action" (p. 301). By the time children start to perform the movements that will later become conventional gestures, they have already been immersed in previous interactions where adults (1) use these gestures to communicate with children, making them salient for the child; (2) respond to and interpret similar noncommunicative hand movements that children use in appropriate contexts; and may even (3) mold these gestures directly using the child's hand to enact them (see, e.g., Guevara et al, 2020).…”

“…In studying children's early gestures, the primary focus of research attention has been on pointing gestures, perhaps because this gesture appears to be ubiquitous in infant development (e.g., Carpendale & Carpendale, 2010;Carpendale & Lewis, 2021;Shinn, 1900;Tomasello et al, 2007). Less attention, however, has been paid to the development of other forms of gestures, such as objectextension gestures, conventional gestures, and iconic gestures (Acredolo & Goodwyn, 1985, 1988Goldin-Meadow & Feldman, 1977;Guevara & Rodríguez, 2023). We examine the "genealogy of gestures" because we are concerned with the origins and development of various forms of gestures and how they differ and are interrelated in the process of development (see Wittgenstein, 1980b, §722, on a genealogy of psychological concepts).…”