Gestures influence the way our brains process grammar

AI Summary

Researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics have found that gestures can influence how the brain processes grammar. Their neuroimaging study shows that hand movements facilitate processing of negative sentences, providing new insights into neurocognitive linguistic mechanisms.

Our hands may do more than complement what we say. They can also help our brains process grammar. In a new neuroimaging study published in PNAS, researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics (MPI) in Nijmegen show that gestures can make it easier to process negative sentences ("I did not sleep"), providing the first neurocognitive evidence that gestures influence grammatical processing.