Newborns identify distinct languages without confusing them.

Researchers have probed the question of whether prenatal infants and newborns, exposed to two languages while in the womb and after birth, are able to distinguish between the languages, and if so, how they avoid confusing the languages.

– Researchers tested one group of newborns who only heard English in the womb and the others who heard English and Tagalog.

– The infants exposed to two languages during pregnancy showed an equal preference for each one.

Babies who hear two languages regularly when they are in their mother’s womb are more open to being bilingual, a study published this week in Psychological Science shows.

Psychological scientists from the University of British Columbia and a researcher from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development in France tested two groups of newborns, one of which only heard English in the womb and the others who heard English and Tagalog, which is spoken in the Philippines.

To determine the babies’ preference for a language, the researchers studied the newborns’ sucking reflex; increased sucking by a neonate indicates interest in a stimulus.

To read the rest of this article, click here.

Click the article title in the sidebar, or the next page, to see the Table of Contents for this article curation.