You may point, but do not touch: Impact of gesture-types and cognition on language in typical and atypical development.

Background: Evidence shows that the relation with the referent (object manipulation, contact/no contact pointing) and the different hand features (index finger/open palm) when pointing indicate different levels of cognitive and linguistic attainment in typical development (TD). This evidences the close link between pointing, cognition and language in TD, but this relation is understudied in autism. Moreover, the longitudinal pathway these abilities follow remains unexplored and it is unclear what specific role (predictor or mediator) pointing and cognition have in both typical and atypical language development.

Different Ways of Making a Point: A Study of Gestural Communication in Typical and Atypical Early Development.

Deictic pointing is among the most impaired gestures in children with autism. Research on typical development demonstrates that contact with the referent and handshape when pointing, are associated with different communicative intentions and developmental stages. Despite their importance, the morphological features of pointing remain largely unexplored in autism.

Gesture and Language Trajectories in Early Development: An Overview From the Autism Spectrum Disorder Perspective.

The well-documented gesture-language relation in typical communicative development (TD) remains understudied in autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Research on early communication skills shows that gesture production is a strong predictor of language in TD, but little is known about the association between gestures and language in ASD. This review focuses on exploring this relation by addressing two topics: the reliability of gestures as predictor of language competences in ASD and the types of potential differences (quantitative, qualitative, or both) in the gesture-language trajectory in children on the autism spectrum compared to typically developing children.