Brief Report: Gestures in Children at Risk for Autism Spectrum Disorders.

Gordon et al. (2015) watched babies who had an older sibling with autism. These babies are at high risk.

The team counted every gesture the babies made at 13-15 months. They checked who later met autism criteria on the ADOS at 20-24 months.

They also looked at whether early gesture totals forecast later language scores.

Babies who went on to meet ADOS autism criteria had shown more gesture disruption at 13-15 months.

Total gesture count at that age predicted both receptive and expressive language scores months later.

Veness et al. (2012) got the same signal a little earlier. Their community sample showed gesture deficits on the CDI at 12 months already separate ASD from other delays.

Lyall et al. (2014) seems to disagree. They found school-age kids with ASD gestured less than peers. The twist: age matters. Gupta looks before diagnosis; Kristen looks after. The two pictures fit together like a timeline.

McGarty et al. (2018) stretched the timeline backward. They showed the slowest gesture and language growth curves start diverging at 6 months, giving us an even earlier heads-up.

You can add a 30-second gesture tally to any 12-15 month screening visit. Fewer gestures red-flag autism risk and forecast language delays. Share the count with families and early-intervention teams so therapy can start sooner.