Gesture as representational action: A paper about function

Abstract

A great deal of attention has recently been paid to gesture and its effects on thinking and learning. It is well established that the hand movements that accompany speech are an integral part of communication, ubiquitous across cultures, and a unique feature of human behavior. In an attempt to understand this intriguing phenomenon, researchers have focused on pinpointing the mechanisms that underlie gesture production. One proposal—that gesture arises from simulated action (see Hostetter & Alibali, 2008)—has opened up discussions about action, gesture, and the relation between the two. However, there is another side to understanding a phenomenon, and that is to understand its function. A phenomenon’s function is its purpose rather than its precipitating cause—the why rather than the how. This paper sets forth a theoretical framework for exploring why gesture serves the functions that it does, and reviews where the current literature fits, and fails to fit, this proposal. Our framework proposes that whether or not gesture is simulated action in terms of its mechanism—it is clearly not reducible to action in terms of its function. Most notably, because gestures are abstracted representations and are not actions tied to particular events and objects, they can play a powerful role in thinking and learning beyond the particular, specifically, in supporting generalization and transfer of knowledge.

How do gestures influence thinking and speaking? The gesture-for-conceptualization hypothesis.

“…For example, one may demonstrate how to use a tool by producing movements with the tool that simulate using the tool (Clark, 1996;Streeck, 1996;LeBaron & Streeck, 2000) or one may show how to move or use an object by producing an empty-handed action near the object (Novack, Wakefield, & Goldin-Meadow, 2016).…”

“…Gestures represent the world; in most cases, they do not influence, alter, or directly affect the physical world (Novack & Goldin-Meadow, 2016). Thus, gestures are somewhat "removed" from action-they schematize actions, rather than represent actions veridically (see Annett, 1990).…”

“…This occurs because schematic gestural representations omit concrete details of actions and action-related features of objects. In this way, schematization helps people focus attention on essential elements, and neglect irrelevant details that are tied to specific actions or objects (Novack & Goldin-Meadow, 2016). This schematization makes it easier to transfer the represented information to new contexts (Novack et al, 2014).…”

Seeing Iconic Gestures While Encoding Events Facilitates Children's Memory of These Events

“…The literature on gesture production suggests that the schematic nature of the gestural representation shapes the self‐oriented function of gesture (Goldin‐Meadow, ; Kita, Alibali, & Chu, ; Novack, Congdon, Hemani‐Lopez, & Goldin‐Meadow, ; Novack & Goldin‐Meadow, ). More importantly for the current study, Kita et al.…”

Gesture and Vocabulary Learning in a Second Language

“…Nevertheless, Nicoladis discussed the possibility that simply moving the hands may aid somehow in lexical access (see Macedonia, , for a summary of hypotheses about the source of the enactment effect, including depth of encoding, mental imagery, and kinetic imagery, none of which appears to be mutually exclusive). Consistent with this speculation, Novack and Goldin‐Meadow () proposed a theory of gesture that explicitly differentiates gesture mechanism from gesture function. Novack and Goldin‐Meadow argued that, even if gesture is fundamentally connected to simulated action in terms of its mechanism, its function cannot be reduced to simulated action or the iconic embodiment of mental representations.…”