This study investigated hemispheric lateralization in comprehending and evaluating lecture material with and without nonverbal hand gestures. Participants watched a lecture with and without gesture under conditions of cognitive load in the left or right hemisphere. There were no effects of gesture or load on lecture comprehension, but gesture and load influenced how participants evaluated the lecture. Specifically, presence of gesture significantly influenced participants’ affective evaluations of the lecturer in both load conditions. However, gesture influenced cognitive evaluations of the lecture material only when the right hemisphere was free from cognitive load. The results suggest that the right hemisphere may be specialized for processing information conveyed through hand gestures.
Cited by (17)
Cited by 17 other publications
Guydish, Andrew J. & Jean E. Fox Tree
2025. Collateral signals and conversation quality. Language Sciences 109 ► pp. 101716 ff.
Kelly, Spencer D. & Quang‐Anh Ngo Tran
2025. Exploring the Emotional Functions of Co‐Speech Hand Gesture in Language and Communication. Topics in Cognitive Science 17:3 ► pp. 586 ff.
Özer, Demet, Aslı Özyürek & Tilbe Göksun
2025. Spatial working memory is critical for gesture processing: Evidence from gestures with varying semantic links to speech. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review 32:4 ► pp. 1639 ff.
Li, Wenjing, Ziyi Kuang, Xiaoxue Leng, Richard E. Mayer & Fuxing Wang
2024. Role of Gesturing Onscreen Instructors in Video Lectures: A Set of Three-level Meta-analyses on the Embodiment Effect. Educational Psychology Review 36:3
Niebuhr, Oliver & Ïo Valls-Ratés
2024. 2024 IEEE International Professional Communication Conference (ProComm), ► pp. 96 ff.
White, John & David Givens
2024. The Nonverbal Language of Hands. In Body Language Communication, ► pp. 29 ff.
Valls-Ratés, Ïo, Oliver Niebuhr & Pilar Prieto
2023. Encouraging participant embodiment during VR-assisted public speaking training improves persuasiveness and charisma and reduces anxiety in secondary school students. Frontiers in Virtual Reality 4
Özer, Demet & Tilbe Göksun
2020. Gesture Use and Processing: A Review on Individual Differences in Cognitive Resources. Frontiers in Psychology 11
Hostetter, Autumn B., Stuart H. Murch, Lyla Rothschild & Cierra S. Gillard
2018. Exploring the Effects of Imitating Hand Gestures and Head Nods on L1 and L2 Mandarin Tone Production. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research 61:9 ► pp. 2179 ff.
Radzi, Majdan bin Paharal & Zurina Khairuddin
2016. Nonverbal Communication Among Arab Debaters in Malaysia. In 7th International Conference on University Learning and Teaching (InCULT 2014) Proceedings, ► pp. 859 ff.
Wilson, Amy Alexandra, Michael D. Boatright & Melanie Landon-Hays
2014. Middle School Teachers’ Discipline-Specific Use of Gestures and Implications for Disciplinary Literacy Instruction. Journal of Literacy Research 46:2 ► pp. 234 ff.
Wang, Lin & Mingyuan Chu
2013. The role of beat gesture and pitch accent in semantic processing: An ERP study. Neuropsychologia 51:13 ► pp. 2847 ff.
Yeşil, Rüştü
2008. EVALUATION OF BODY LANGUAGE BEHAVIOR IN A CLASS DEBATE. Social Behavior and Personality: an international journal 36:7 ► pp. 893 ff.
Friedland, Gerald & Raul Rojas
2006. Eighth IEEE International Symposium on Multimedia (ISM'06), ► pp. 895 ff.
Friedland, Gerald & Raul Rojas
2008. Anthropocentric Video Segmentation for Lecture Webcasts. EURASIP Journal on Image and Video Processing 2008 ► pp. 1 ff.
JOHNSON, MOLLY TREADWAY & ELIZABETH C. WIGGINS
2006. Videoconferencing in Criminal Proceedings: Legal and Empirical Issues and Directions for Research. Law & Policy 28:2 ► pp. 211 ff.
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