Hand Gestures

WEDNESDAY, Feb. 9 (HealthDay News) -- Gesturing with your hands while talking can generate mental images that help solve complex problems related to spatial visualization, new research shows.

This article caught my attention.  It's from HealthDay News which claims to have daily health news for consumers and medical professionals.  Actually, I don't remember the entire article but the first sentence got me thinking.  They are talking about talking with your hands.  You know, all that gesturing and waving and hand motion that goes on when someone is talking.  What?  You don't do that?  Really?
I'm told I do that.  I've been accused of not being able to speak if I have to keep my hands still.  I've been teased at times to put my hands down - that they are talking too loud.  When I was little I was told not to talk so much at the table or was that to stop waving my fork around?
Now this.  Looky here.  Hand gesturing can help solve complex problems related to spatial visualization.
My first thought was...who decided to research this?  Was it a non-hand gesticulator that grew tired of asking their companion to stop moving their hands and thought science would prove it wasn't good?  Was it a scientist with the talking hand syndrome that wanted to prove it wasn't such a bad thing?  I wonder who thought up the idea to research it and why?
Then the results of the research are interesting in that it says hand gestures can generate mental images.  It sure can.  I can conjure a few mental images from certain hand gestures.  I mean, come on?  Can't everyone?  But aside from that it helps solve complex problems related to spatial visualization.
Okay.  I have to admit that threw me.  What is spatial visualization?  I looked it up.  I think I understand what it means after reading several definitions but it took a few definitions and a little more research to figure out what the definition meant.  The definition reads like a sentence diagram.  You remember those...where you have to detail the noun, verb and such stuff.  The definition had sub-definitions of other things you needed to look up in order to understand what the original definition meant.  Then it gave examples of what it means since they seemed to understand that the definition wasn't very clear.  Basically, you need to give hand gestures to explain the definition of spatial visualization for anyone to understand it.
Now, I'm not sure but that might have been the basis for the results of the research that was done.  I mean, if you need to use hand gestures to understand the definition of spatial visualization, then it would seem that the hand gestures would prove to help conjure the mental images you need to solve complex problems about it.
I think.  Right?  What else could it mean?
I always knew that I was better understood when I used my hands to talk.  They needed research to prove it?  Really?  Hmpft.  Wow. 
When all they needed to do was ask any Italian like me.  
TT