Book contents
- Pointing
- Pointing
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Contributors
- Preface
- Introduction to Pointing:
- Part One Culture and Development
- 1 Pointing at, Talking about, and Looking Away:
- 2 The Design of Pointing
- 3 Development of Pointing in Toddlers:
- 4 Attention Management by Deictic Gestures and Demonstratives:
- 5 Pointing to Dinner Participants in Deaf and Hearing Children’s and Adults’ Signing and Gesturing
- 6 The Cultural Nature of Early Social Communication
- 7 Pointing at Local Knowledge:
- 8 The Role of Infant Pointing in Child-Led Caregiving:
- 9 How Infants Learn to Follow Attention from Gaze-Direction and Pointing Gestures
- 10 Touch, Pointing and Mind-Reading
- 11 Socially Signaling Robotics:
- 12 Developmental Significance of the Human Pointing Gesture
- Part Two Evolutionary Perspectives
- Index
- References
3 - Development of Pointing in Toddlers:
Cultural and Epistemological Perspectives
from Part One - Culture and Development
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 23 June 2026
Book contents
- Pointing
- Pointing
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Contributors
- Preface
- Introduction to Pointing:
- Part One Culture and Development
- 1 Pointing at, Talking about, and Looking Away:
- 2 The Design of Pointing
- 3 Development of Pointing in Toddlers:
- 4 Attention Management by Deictic Gestures and Demonstratives:
- 5 Pointing to Dinner Participants in Deaf and Hearing Children’s and Adults’ Signing and Gesturing
- 6 The Cultural Nature of Early Social Communication
- 7 Pointing at Local Knowledge:
- 8 The Role of Infant Pointing in Child-Led Caregiving:
- 9 How Infants Learn to Follow Attention from Gaze-Direction and Pointing Gestures
- 10 Touch, Pointing and Mind-Reading
- 11 Socially Signaling Robotics:
- 12 Developmental Significance of the Human Pointing Gesture
- Part Two Evolutionary Perspectives
- Index
- References
Summary
The chapter is centered around a cross-cultural approach of pointing development in the human species, in a socio-constructivist frame that insists on the cultural situatedness of meanings. Based on a few studies of infants’ pointing gestures, in relation with language development, the chapter goes back over potential issues and challenges in cross-cultural psychology and proposes some empirical and epistemological perspectives for future research. More specifically, the chapter highlights the multiple dimensions of the researchers’ responsibility when comparing early communicative development across cultures, referring for example to the notions of positionality and reflexivity. This contribution may guide the analysis of pointing throughout child development and help deconstruct the assumption of a universal expression of this gesture across cultures.
Keywords
Information
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- PointingCulture, Development, and Evolution, pp. 54 - 72Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2026
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Structural and Technical Features
ARIA roles provided
You gain clarity from ARIA (Accessible Rich Internet Applications) roles and attributes, as they help assistive technologies interpret how each part of the content functions.
You gain clarity from ARIA (Accessible Rich Internet Applications) roles and attributes, as they help assistive technologies interpret how each part of the content functions.