Gesture - Online First

The study investigated whether the perspective of multimodal input in visuospatial maps predicts children’s spatial performance, particularly verbal recall and direction-following behavior. 5-year-old monolingual Turkish children were engaged in the Directions Task, which included visuospatial maps and videos of a speaker describing routes on maps in three conditions: Speech-Gesture combination with a front-facing view, Speech-Gesture combination with an upper back angle, and Speech-only condition with a front-facing view for control. Children were asked to verbally recall and draw the route described in the videos. They also engaged in perspective-taking, mental rotation, and relational reasoning tasks. Results showed that children’s verbal recall, but not necessarily behavioral recall, was enhanced by receiving multimodal directions. Moreover, children’s relational reasoning and perspective-taking abilities modulate their verbal recall performances. The results of this study underline the importance of multimodal input and presentation perspective in enhancing children’s spatial performance.