Abstract
Iconic gesture-speech integration is a relatively recent field of investigation with numerous researchers studying its various aspects. The results obtained are just as diverse. The definition of iconic gestures is often overlooked in the interpretations of results. Furthermore, while most behavioral studies have demonstrated an advantage of bimodal presentation, brain activity studies show a diversity of results regarding the brain regions involved in the processing of this integration. Clinical studies also yield mixed results, some suggesting parallel processing channels, others a unique and integrated channel. This review aims to draw attention to the methodological variations in research on iconic gesture-speech integration and how they impact conclusions regarding the underlying phenomena. It will also attempt to draw together the findings from other relevant research and suggest potential areas for further investigation in order to better understand processes at play during speech integration process.
Highlights
Introduction“Gestures” refer to dynamic movements of the hands (Novack et al, 2016), with “iconic gestures” referring more precisely to manual movements allowing for the transmission of additional or redundant information to the speech they accompany (Kita and Özyürek, 2003; Willems et al, 2007)
Exploring the comprehension of complementary iconic gestures would allow to paint a more complete picture of gesture-speech comprehension in schizophrenia. Following this overview on the investigations of gesturespeech integration and the role of iconic gestures in language comprehension, an undeniable observation is the diversity of methods used, and the associated variation in results
Studies investigating neurologically intact individuals agree on attributing an active role to iconic gestures in improving language comprehension, in an unfavorable listening context
Summary
“Gestures” refer to dynamic movements of the hands (Novack et al, 2016), with “iconic gestures” referring more precisely to manual movements allowing for the transmission of additional or redundant information to the speech they accompany (Kita and Özyürek, 2003; Willems et al, 2007). Since the 1990s, numerous attempts have been made to understand the mechanisms underlying the understanding of these gestures and their integration into the associated verbal utterance. These gestures appear to possess semantic information that is related to the verbally conveyed message. Iconic gestures convey meaning semantically related to the content of the co-occurring speech (McNeill, 1992) This definition of iconic gestures can be found in the majority, if not all, of the studies conducted on gesturespeech integration.
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