Babies could be understanding more than we think: Study

By Dr. Ananya Mandal, MDFeb 14 2012

New research shows that although babies do not more than babble for the first six to nine months of life, they understand the meaning of many spoken words. The finding by American psychologists overturns conventional thinking that young infants can only process the sound patterns of their native language, such as vowels and consonants.

The results reported today in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences by University of Pennsylvania Associate Professor Daniel Swingely and doctoral student Elika Bergelson showed infants had learnt the meanings of words for foods and body parts. The study implies that babies learn the sound structure of spoken language at the same time as they begin acquiring language.

“I think it's surprising in the sense that kids at this age aren't saying anything, they're not pointing, they're not walking,” Ms Bergelson said. “But . . . under the surface, they're trying to put together the things in the world with the words that go with them.”

For the study the psychologists studied 33 babies aged between six and nine months, along with a comparison group of 50 aged 10 to 20 months. Under controlled conditions, to prevent any unconscious signalling, the researchers presented infants with sets of paired pictures or scenes - say an apple and a nose, or food on a table and human figures - while their parent named a picture in each set. The infants consistently directed their gaze to the named object.

Dr Bergelson added, “We're testing things that look different every time you see them. There's some variety in apples and noses, and 'nose' doesn't just mean your nose; it could mean anybody's nose. This is one of the things that makes word learning complicated: words often refer to categories, not just individuals.”

The pair found no improvement in the pattern of learning from six months to nine months, although at 14 months word recognition jumped dramatically. Dr Swingley said, “Maybe what is going on with the 14-month olds is they understand the nature of the task as a kind of game and they're playing it. Or the dramatic increase in performance at 14 months may be due to aspects of language development we did not measure specifically, including better categorization of the speech signal, or better understanding of syntax.”

Dr Swingley said, “There had been a few demonstrations of understanding before, involving words like mommy and daddy. Our study is different in looking at more generic words, words that refer to categories. I think this study presents a great message to parents: You can talk to your babies and they're going to understand a bit of what you're saying. They're not going to give us back witty repartee, but they understand some of it. And the more they know, the more they can build on what they know.”