Young deaf and hearing children's understanding of intentions signalled by nonverbal gestural cues directed to a third person

The development of socio-cognitive skills depends on understanding others' behavioral cues. We studied 43 toddlers (21 girls, 22 boys, aged 10-37 months; 74% White Hispanic), including 21 deaf and hard of hearing (DHH) children, using data collected in Catalonia (Spain) between November 2022 and July 2023. An experimenter indicated a hidden toy's location to an assistant either by a point with gaze or by gaze only. Both DHH and hearing toddlers understood the point with gaze cue. However, only the hearing group interpreted the gaze-only cue by reliably searching for the hidden toy. These findings reveal early language-related differences in social-cognitive development that may underlie later challenges in complex theory of mind reasoning.