Some Gestures Develop in Conjunction with Spoken Language Development and Others Don’t: Evidence from Bilingual Preschoolers

In past studies, different kinds of gestures have shown different developmental trajectories, with iconic gestures being acquired after words and other gestures before. Similarly, when speech is missing or weak, iconic gestures are rarely used in compensation. These results suggest that iconic gestures are less independent of speech than other kinds of gestures. The present study tested this idea in French-English bilingual children who showed unequal proficiency in their two languages. Eight children between the ages of 3;6 and 4;11 were videotaped in two separate free-play sessions, one in each language. Their use of gestures was coded. The results showed that the children used a higher rate of iconics in their more proficient language but the use of other kinds of gestures did not differ by proficiency. These results suggest that the relationship between iconic gestures and speech is closer than that of other kinds of gestures with speech and cannot therefore be used in the preschool years as a compensatory strategy for weak proficiency.