signing in hearing babies

Sat Mar 25 23:21:20 UTC 2000

On Fri, 24 Mar 2000, James Russell wrote:

> Recently there was a TV report in the UK on the work
> of Garcia, who teaches ASL to very young, hearing babies. The
> claim is that this releases the communicative floodgates and reveals
> symbolic competetence far ealier than previously reported -
> not to mention making the terrible 2s less terrible.
>
> A literature search has not revealed any published work
> on this. Any references or views would be gratefully
> received.

Hi, James.  This has been a big year for publicity on baby signing.
I know of Garcia's work only indirectly, but I started adding
signs borrowed from ASL to child-directed speech in the early 80s.
(Note:  this is very different from using ASL itself!--a language
that, like any other, requires years of study and is relatively
un-English-like in its structure.)  Data from 13 typical babies and
toddlers (plus 12 with developmental delays) are reported in:
  Abrahamsen, A. A., Cavallo, M. M., and McCluer, J. A. (1985).
     Is the sign advantage a robust phenomenon?  From gesture to
     language in two modalities.  Merrill-Palmer Quarterly, 31, 177-209.
The answer was no, but more on this at the end (this is a long message
that others may not want to read in its entirety).

Recently I wrote a review of baby signing that included some
new data from the 13 typical babies but especially benefited
from longitudinal data from a large number of families (N=32)
generously sent to me by Linda Acredolo and Susan Goodwyn
(the authors of the 1998 book for parents that Brian noted
in his reply to your message--I call them AG in what follows):
  Abrahamsen, A. A. (in press; expected May 2000).
  Explorations of enhanced gestural input to children in the
  bimodal period.  In H. Lane and K. Emmorey (Eds.).  The Signs
  of Language Revisited:  An Anthology to Honor Ursula Bellugi
  and Edward Klima.  Hillsdale, NJ:  Erlbaum.

In AG's studies, baby signs were chosen or invented by parents/babies
rather than borrowed from ASL--I think there are advantages to that
early on, but that parents of babies who become especially prolific
may find it convenient to start pulling some signs from an ASL
dictionary (there are some good ones emphasizing signs relevant
to young children).  The source of the signs is not a major issue,
in my opinion (contrary to Garcia), since baby signing declines by
19-26 months and all but disappears soon thereafter.  I refer to
baby signs, from whatever source, as "enhanced gesturing" to
emphasize that baby signing builds on a naturally occurring, though
limited, tendency to use a few gestures symbolically with noun,
verb, or adjective meanings (vs. the very frequent use of deictic
gestures like pointing).  We know this from Acredolo and
Goodwyn (CD 1988), who counted an average of 5 such baby signs
per family when there was no training or special effort.

Your main interest is in the advantages of making a special
effort to include more such baby signs in adult-baby interactions.
AG note enhancements to parent-child interaction and also some
small but statistically significant improvements in acquisition
of spoken words and in more general measures of intelligence.
I can't do justice to their wealth of analyses here but
recommend reading their book and their academic publications
(references to a few are at the end of this message).
They would like the effects to be recognized but not blown
out of proportion.

One question that always comes up is whether signs can be
acquired earlier than words.  In my review, I did some
adjustments to make AG's data directly comparable to data
on first word and first ASL sign from 8 hearing children
with a deaf parent in a 1991 study by Folven & Bonvillian
(FB). Using both studies provides data for children whose
input is intensive, linguistically structured and early (FB)
versus less intensive and nonlinguistic at 11 months (AG).

It's impressive how little these input differences matter--
where FB and AG have comparable data, the ages are very similar.
FB's children acquire their first sign 3 months earlier than
their first word (8.3 vs. 11.5 mo.), but the difference
disappears when imitations and other nonsymbolic uses are
excluded (12.5 vs. 12.2 mo.)  Sign forms are often easier to
approximate than word forms, but they get caught in the same
bottleneck of cognitive and linguistic development as do words.
In AG's data the ages for first and tenth form and first and
tenth symbolic form show no advantage for signs--presumably
because their children are just beyond the 8-11 mo. period in which
FB got a sign form advantage.  (Signs did have a small advantage
when AG, in a 1993 CD paper, excluded children who had already
begun talking.)

Most gesture and sign researchers note the overall equipotentiality
of the manual and vocal modalities.  My review emphasizes this, as
well as the considerable individual differences across children.
Signs and words co-exist for months.  At any given age in what
I call the bimodal period (starting 8-12 mo and in decline by
19-26 mo or so), almost all children exposed to enhanced gesturing
(baby signs) have some signs and some words (or at least some
vocalizations with a consistent meaning, like the urgent "uh...uh
...uh" when a child wants something).  But the emphasis and relative
numbers vary.  Some children talk early and show little interest
in most signs; some are prolific in both, some slow in both.
The fourth pattern--children with an extended period of signing
more than speaking are fascinating, but aren't the only story.

Also in favor of a bimodal perspective:  Early on, children tend to
pick up signs for some things and words for other things (often
because one or the other is easier to form--"mama" is an easy
word; "smelling" one's hand is an easy sign for flower).  In my
data, using a sign and word with the same meaning simultaneously
becomes more common later, and then the signs get dropped.
But for especially hard words, signs can fill the gap even at
the older end of the range.  And the age at which hearing children
start dropping signs is in the same ballpark as the age that
deaf children start acquiring the linguistic structure of ASL
(so, they are leaving behind baby signing, even if they retain
or improve on the signs themselves).

Bottom line:  enhanced gesturing (baby signing) doesn't belong
on an any must-do lists--but does provide one way we adults can
adapt to the nature of babies in the face of all the ways babies
have to adapt to us.  For most families it's enjoyable, and there
are some modest but real benefits.  And for those whose babies turn
out to be late talkers (not yet known when you start baby signs),
the advantages may be considerable.

Finally, I'll note that in my review I was actually more
interested in standard deviations than in mean ages.  The 1985
paper found dramatic differences in word acquisition, but
similarity in sign acquisition, across 3 biologically different
groups when equated for overall developmental level (Down syndrome,
other delayed, typical development).  I wondered whether the
between-group differences in word acquisition were rooted in
especially high variability for emergence of words more generally
within our species.  If so, ages at which milestones are reached
should be more variable for words than signs even within the
typical groups studied by AG and FB.  But when I calculated
standard deviations for each milestone in these two data sets
(and for other measures in my own typical group), without
exception words and signs had very similar standard deviations.
I concluded (tentatively, pending more data sets) that the
1985 between-group differences for words were an outcome of
how different kinds of damage impact development, and had no
deeper cause in a disproportionate variability in speech
within our species.

For more on the between-groups comparisons and data from
additional children with Down syndrome, see:

Abrahamsen, A. A., Lamb, M., Brown-Williams, J., & McCarthy,
S. (1991).  Boundary conditions on language emergence:
Contributions from atypical learners and input.  In P. Siple
& S. Fischer (Eds.), Theoretical issues in sign language
research.  Volume 2:  Psychology (pp. 231-254).  Chicago:
University of Chicago Press.

And a few of the publications by AG and FB:

Acredolo, L. P., & Goodwyn, S. W. (1998).  Baby signs: How to
talk with your baby before your baby can talk.  Chicago:
NTB/Contemporary Publishers.

S. W. Goodwyn & L. P. Acredolo (1993), Symbolic gesture versus
word:  Is there a modality advantage for onset of symbol use?
Child Development, 64, 688-701.

Linda Acredolo, et al. (1999), The signs and sounds of early
langauge development.  In C. Tamis-LeMonda & L. Balter (Eds.),
Child Psychology:  A Handbook of Contemporary Issues.  Garland
Press.

Folven, R. J., & Bonvillian, J. D. (1991). The transition from
nonreferential to referential language in children acquiring
American Sign Language.  Developmental Psychology, 27, 806-816.

Also of interest (among many more):

Iverson, J. M., &  Goldin-Meadow, S. (Eds.) (1998).  The nature
and functions of gesture in children's communication.  New
Directions for Child Development, No. 79. Jossey-Bass.

Meier, R. P., & Newport, E. (1990).  Out of the hands of babes:
on a possible sign advantage in language acquisition.
Language, 6, 1-23.

Volterra, V., & Erting, C. J. (Eds.) (1990).  From gesture to
language in hearing and deaf children (pp. 263-277).  Berlin:
Springer-Verlag.

--
Dr. Adele Abrahamsen
Associate Professor and Undergraduate Director of Philosophy-
     Neuroscience-Psychology and Linguistic Studies Programs
Department of Psychology
Washington University in St. Louis
Campus Box 1125
One Brookings Drive
St. Louis, MO  63130-4899

Office telephone:  (314) 935-7445
Office location:   New Psychology Building, Room 410B

Email:  adele at twinearth.wustl.edu
Fax:    (314) 935-7588

PNP website:  www.artsci.wustl.edu/~philos/pnp/
Linguistic Studies website:  www.artsci.wustl.edu/~ling/