Mom's Baby Talk Crucial For Baby
Adults have to engage in baby talk, regardless of the language they speak, so that babies can learn to talk like adults. Kevin Begos reports.
SUBSCRIBE TO Science Quickly
On supporting science journalism
If you're enjoying this article, consider supporting our award-winning journalism by subscribing. By purchasing a subscription you are helping to ensure the future of impactful stories about the discoveries and ideas shaping our world today.
It turns out that whether you grew up speaking English, Mandarin or Swahili, you learned by listening to your mother speak in that seemingly silly, high-pitched baby talk. Researchers at the University of Washington have discovered what's special - and apparently universal - about baby talk. It turns out that mothers stretch vowels to make speech clearer. And infants are so attracted to the higher-pitched talk that they'll turn their heads to listen over and over. They don’t do that when confronted with normal adult speech.
The researchers also found that by just 12 months of age, the infant brains start to favor a specific language. And the ability to understand foreign languages starts to decline. But the brains of babies who grew up learning two languages may stay open to new sounds longer. And there are no shortcuts to a mother or other adult making all those silly sounds—research also shows that infants learn virtually nothing from even high quality recordings of baby talk. No they don’t! No they don’t!
--Kevin Begos
Subscribe to Support Independent Journalism
Great science journalism requires human expertise, time, effort and creativity. And it costs money. That’s why I and the journalists here at Scientific American hope you’ll join our community.
When you subscribe, you are supporting staff and freelance journalists who are passionate about telling science stories that are true, important and compelling. Our editors and reporters are often experts in their fields, which means they understand the nuances of big discoveries and can untangle the breakthroughs from the hype. With a subscription, you are also supporting rigorous fact-checking to ensure the words we publish are precise and accurate. And you’re supporting original illustrations, graphics and photos that bring you closer to an advanced laboratory, an ice sheet in Antarctica or a space mission in orbit. You’re helping us craft other types of high-quality journalism as well: Our newsletters are carefully written, edited and curated by staffers you have or will come to know and love. Our Science Quickly podcast is based on original reporting, collaboration with editors and scientists and exacting production.
Subscriptions keep this engine running so we can continue to deliver thoughtful, rigorous and independent science journalism to you. In an era of viral misinformation, this work is crucial. If you value what we do, I hope you’ll consider joining us as a subscriber
