Gestures helps guessing hte meaning of signs at first exposure

What is it about?

People use their implicit knowledge of gesture to make assumptions about the meaning of signs never seen before. Using our database of silent gesture by hearing non-signers we identified NGT signs whose forms had high/low overlap with gesture. Then we showed these signs to a different group of participants while recording ERPs. Signs with low similarity with gestures (low overlap) elicited a P300 component (P3a) which indexes disconfirmed expectations. Signs with strong similarities (high overlap) didn’t cause the same effect. Effect disappeared after participants were taught signs. We argue that non-signers use their implicit knowledge about iconic gestures to make predictions about the meaning of signs never seen before. Iconic gestures can be regarded as manual #cognates during sign L2 acquistion

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Why is it important?

This work is unique in that it suggests that people without any knowledge of any sign language can accurately interpret the meaning of signs never seen before. This has important implications for the teaching of sign languages as a second language where gesture could be used as an addition semiotic tool.