Gesture size affects numerical estimates in quantifier comprehension

Lorson, Alexandra and Macuch-Silva, Vinicius and Hart, Christopher and Winter, Bodo (2024) Gesture size affects numerical estimates in quantifier comprehension. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition. ISSN 0278-7393

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Abstract

People think and talk about numerical magnitude in terms of space, and co-speech gestures reflect this, with English speakers using expansive gestures when talking about greater quantities. Existing gestural research on the spatial conceptualization of number has largely looked at gesture production, but we do not know whether gestures can influence the interpretation of imprecise or underspecified numerical expressions such as quantifiers. Looking at the quantifier as a test case, this study investigates the influence of manual inwards-directed (i.e., hands move closer the torso) and outwards-directed (i.e., hands move away from the torso) co-speech gestures on comprehenders' conceptualization of quantities associated with through three preregistered experiments. Our results suggest that gesture modulates the interpretation of such that speakers moving their hands outwards and thereby creating space between their hands lead to higher quantity estimates, compared to speakers not gesturing, or moving their hands inwards. We discuss the implications of our findings for future work in numerical cognition, multimodal communication, and pragmatics. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Item Type:
Journal Article
Journal or Publication Title:
Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition
Uncontrolled Keywords:
/dk/atira/pure/subjectarea/asjc/3200/3205
Subjects:
?? experimental and cognitive psychology ??
ID Code:
224317
Deposited By:
Deposited On:
26 Sep 2024 09:10
Refereed?:
Yes
Published?:
Published
Last Modified:
26 Sep 2024 09:10