Parenting: Within hours of being born, babies begin to distinguish sounds and develop language skills
Useful for parents to know (a great parenting tip): Babies start to learn language by hearing speech whilst in the womb. But the sound is muffled. A new study shows that within a few hours of being born, babies start to distinguish sounds and begin to tune into specific languages.
Useful for health professionals and parents to know!
Whilst developing in the womb, babies can hear speech.
Not surprisingly, the sounds they hear are muffled and indistinct.
The sounds they hear are as if the baby is underwater, which of course they are, inside the amniotic fluid, inside the amniotic sac, inside the womb.
Now new research has found that within just a few hours of being born, babies start to distinguish sounds and they even start to tune in to specific languages they’ll be speaking.
Or in scientific language, to quote from the abstract: “Neonates thus exhibit ultra-fast tuning to natural phonemes in the first hours after birth.”
So what’s the top tip for parents and health professionals?
Provided that the newborn baby is healthy, for parents and their baby to have at…
