THE DEVELOPMENT OF GESTURES IN THREE SUBCULTURAL GROUPS*.

American children living on an Army post in Germany, American children living off the post, and German children were tested for their ability to interpret and to transmit gestures most frequently used by a group of children in the Midwestern United States. It was found accurate use of these gestures could not be predicted from the amount of exposure to an American culture that the three groups had experienced. Socioeconomic differences were found to be important in gestural accuracy in a previous study and appeared to be important in the present study as well. Both the American and German children who had been exposed to both cultures learned the gestures of both cultures. There were no sex differences in gestural accuracy obtained for any of the three groups observed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]