Babble Rousers: Babies find their voice when given social push
By Bruce Bower
Eight-month-old infants utter more complex, speechlike sounds when their mothers encourage them with well-timed touches and smiles rather than with words offered as models to imitate, a new study finds.
This provides the first evidence that nonverbal interactions with caregivers shape babies’ vocal learning, says psychologist Michael H. Goldstein of Franklin and Marshall College in Lancaster, Pa. The power of maternal behaviors to ramp up babies’ babbling corresponds to the way certain bird species learn to sing, propose Goldstein and his coworkers Andrew P. King and Meredith J. West, both of Indiana University in Bloomington.