Il ruolo della comunicazione gestuale nell’acquisizione del linguaggio

The purpose of the contribution is to describe the characteristics of gestural communication, underlining how this can be considered a precursor of symbolic function and a valid support for language acquisition. According to these hypothesis, here are discussed some study conducted by Fasolo & D’Odorico (2002a; 2002b; 2005) on a Late Talker group of 20 months of age, comparing their communicative production with those of a control group. Results showed that at 20 Late Talkers infants produced less pointing, less referential gestures and less combination of pointing and gaze toward mother. These variables are also significantly related to vocabulary size at 30 months of age. Results could be interpreted as a deficit for Late Talkers to engage joint attention format with mothers, and could be helpful in a rehabilitation therapy.