Thread by @anniemurphypaul

So powerful is the effect of gesturing while learning that it can improve learners’ comprehension of a complex concept, EVEN WHEN they are not aware of the connection between the concept and the gesture they've been instructed to make.
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Simply making a conceptually-congruent gesture while they’re learning about the concept helps clarify and reinforce the concept—forming a second channel of instruction that’s independent of the verbal one.
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Matthew Hutson writes about "hand movements’ subconscious effects on learning" in a new article for Scientific American. He describes a study led by Icy (Yunyi) Zhang of UCLA, recently published in the journal Cognitive Science.
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In the study, college students watched an instructional video that explained the concept of a “statistical model.” The video presented a visualization of two data sets; one data set contained more variation than the other.
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In the video, variation was represented by red bars that stayed clustered together (less variation) or moved in a vertical direction, spreading themselves apart (more variation).
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Students who were asked to imitate the bars' vertical motion with their hands achieved a better understanding of the statistical model concept than students who were asked to move their hands in a horizontal direction, and than students who did not gesture at all.
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"Hand movements that occur independent of the performer’s knowledge of their purpose can facilitate learning," Zhang and her coauthors conclude.
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Here's Hutson's Scientific American article: bit.ly/3mO2RvO

And here's Zhang's Cognitive Science article: bit.ly/3mUfEgA

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