Is There a Correlation Between the Use of Representational Gestures and Self-adaptors?

There are individual differences between people in their production of representational gestures, hand movements that represent the referent. In the present study, we test whether there is a correlation between the production of gestures and the production of self-adaptors. Self-adaptors are self-touching movements, often thought to function as a method of self-soothing. People high on neuroticism produce a lot of self-adaptors. One previous study showed that people high on neuroticism produced a lot of representational gestures. Using data from Punjabi-English bilinguals that had been collected for other purposes, we coded both self-adaptors and representational gestures. The bilinguals had been asked to perform an origami task, once in Punjabi and once in English. The results showed that the more self-adaptors the bilinguals produced, the more representational gestures they produced in both languages. We found a weak relationship between proficiency in each language and gesture use. We argue that there is likely an underlying variable that leads to production of both gestures and self-adaptors, such as neuroticism. Further studies are needed to test that interpretation.