Children’s Object Manipulation: A Tool for Knowing the External World and for Communicative Development

The progressive acquisition of manipulative skill is an important developmental milestone. It provides infants with an increasing set of opportunities for knowing the external world and for acquiring abilities also relevant to other domains, most especially social interaction. The ability to use the hands to grasp and extend an object in a directed fashion toward an interlocutor facilitates the establishment of shared attention. Thus, the progression in manipulative ability can serve as an agent of change, not only for motor development in general, but also for communication. This chapter will consider the progressive acquisition of manipulative skills during development, their significance for knowing the external world and, in particular, their close relation to the communicative development of children.