Markers of communicative relevance of gesture in multimodal demonstrations to adults and children.

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2015-07-23
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en
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Speakers adapt the information conveyed in their speech and gestures in various ways for their audience, a phenomenon known as recipient design. I investigate further whether speakers use ostensive signals such as eye gaze and/or ostensive speech (e.g., like this) in relation to their gestures when designing their messages for different addressees (to a child or adult) in a multimodal demonstration task. Sixteen adult participants from Italy were asked to explain a puzzle game to another adult and to a child while they were videotaped. On average, speakers highlighted 1/4 of their iconic gestures with adults and 1/3 with children. Speakers used more eye gaze towards their gestures with adults than with children, but they were more likely to use combined ostensive signals (ostensive speech and eye gaze) with children than with adults. Thus, speakers use also other channels of communication than speech and/or gesture in a coordinated fashion to design their communicative message for their addresses.
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Faculteit der Letteren