Think of the last time you met a baby in the company of an
adult. Chances are your conversation went something like this:
To baby, in high- pitched
voice:
"Helloooo, sweeeetie. How's my baaabeee?
Ooooh, you're sooo cute. You are sooooo cuuuuute!"
To adult, groaning:
“What a day. It took me 15 minutes to get on the freeway, then another half-hour to make it to work. I was late to the morning meeting again.”
To baby, high-pitched:
"Can you give me a smiiile? Give me a big,
big smiiile!"
It’s a phenomenon that even the most serious-minded parents can’t
explain—see a baby, start talking in silly voices.
Researchers call the special way we talk to babies “motherese” or “parentese.”
This sing-song speech, often accompanied by exaggerated facial
expressions, seems to be used by nearly everyone who talks to a baby. (Gopnik,
Meltzoff & Kuhl, 1999; Grieser & Kuhl,1998; Snow, 1977) We all love to
do it—mothers, fathers, grandparents, friends, even preschoolers
addressing younger brothers and sisters. And what’s more, babies seem to
like it, too.
How do we know
infants like it?
Researchers have found that infants prefer to hear parentese to adult
conversation. (Fernald, 1985)
To test this, scientists sat babies in their mother’s laps and let them
choose to hear tapes of adult-to-adult speech or adult-to-infant speech
(parentese). When babies turned their heads one way, an eight second
tape of adult conversation played. When they turned their heads the
other way, the babies heard parentese. The researchers found that the
babies consistently chose to turn their heads to hear the speech
directed toward infants (Fernald, 1985). Amazingly, further testing
showed this to be true even when the speaker spoke in a foreign
language. (Gopnik et al., 1999)
Babies, quite simply, enjoy hearing the higher-pitched sounds and
exaggerated speech patterns of parentese. Babies not only enjoy the
sounds we make when we do it, they also enjoy watching our faces as we
talk to them.
In fact, researchers have found that babies as young as five months old
are capable of some simple lip reading. In this test, babies were first
shown a silent video of a face forming the sounds “ahhh” or “eeee” and
then they heard audiotapes of one of the sounds. The babies knew which
face matched which sound. Babies hearing the “ahhh” sound looked at the
video with the wide-open mouth, while those that heard “eeee” looked at
the video with the grinning mouth. (Kuhl & Meltzoff 1982; Gopnik, et
al.,1999)
Does parentese
help infants learn?
Does parentese serve a purpose beyond making everyone feel warm and
happy? Could sing-song speech, silly faces and short, simple sentences
of baby talk help infants learn language?
Researchers are just beginning to look at the possible benefits of
parentese. In fact, one recent study found that parentese helps children
acquire certain aspects of language. (Thiessen, Hill & Saffron, 2005)
Our universal
mother tongue.
It’s well established that most of us use
parentese, regardless of our culture or native tongue. (Kuhl, et
al.,1997) Various studies have documented parentese in speakers of
English, German, Russian and Swedish. One study found parentese among
speakers of Mandarin Chinese, a tonal language in which, unlike English
or German, a change in the pitch of a word alters the meaning of that
word. (Grieser & Kuhl, 1988)
But, in every language, parentese seems to share several characteristics
and scientists theorize that it has several purposes.
Parentese is higher-pitched, sometimes as much
as an octave higher. Why do we all seem to become sopranos when we
talk to babies? It may help to get their attention.
Parentese uses short and simple sentences,
often repeated over and over again. We’ve all said it, probably
multiple times, “Who’s a sweet baby? Are you a sweet baby? Yes, you’re
a sweet, sweet baby.” Repeating ourselves may help babies figure out
words, and simple, repeated sentences may help them with grammar.
Parentese features well-formed, elongated
consonants and vowels. We tend to pronounce words precisely when we
talk to babies—pulling out the vowel sounds and clearly voicing
consonants—in marked contrast to the hurried way we speak to other
adults. A slurred “sweebabe” becomes a bright “sweeet baaabeee” when
spoken to someone who truly fits the description. Hearing the
exaggerated sounds of parentese may make it easier for infants to
learn the sounds of their own
language. Research in this area provides the clearest indication so
far that babies use parentese to help solve the mystery of language. (Gopnik,
et al., 1999)
Helpful
Parenting Tips
To help your child learn language, use parentese.
And don’t be embarrassed about it for a second.
Around the world, adults love to use parentese. Babies love to hear
parentese. It’s delightful to move in close to a child and communicate
in a warm, friendly way that’s sure to get a smile. And the slow,
higher-pitched, sing-song speech may be just what an infant needs to
hear to help her figure out how language is put together.
Talk to your baby as you go through the day. Even if young
children don’t understand what your words mean, they love to hear
the sounds of language. And don’t be shy about smiling and making
goo-goo eyes while you talk!
Move in close when talking to your child, so
that your baby can see your face and watch your lips move when you
talk.
Draw out your vowels and pitch your voice as
high as you like.
References:
Fernald, A. (1985).
Four-month-old infants prefer to listen to motherese. Infant
Behavior & Development, 8, 181-195.
Gopnik, A., Meltzoff,
A. N., & Kuhl, P. K. (1999). The scientist in the crib: Minds,
brains, and how children learn. New York: William Morrow & Co.
Grieser, D. L., &
Kuhl, P. K. (1988). Maternal speech to infants in a tonal language:
Support for universal prosodic features in motherese. Developmental
Psychology, 24(1), 14-20.
Kuhl, P. K.,
Andruski, J. E., Chistovich, I. A., Chistovich, L. A., Kozhevnikova,
E. V., Ryskina, V. L., et al. (1997). Cross-language analysis of
phonetic units in language addressed to infants. Science, 277,
684-686.
Kuhl, P. K., &
Meltzoff, A. N. (1982). The bimodal perception of speech in infancy.
Science, 218, 1138-1141.
Snow, C. E. (1977).
The development of conversation between mothers and babies. Journal
of Child Language, 4, 1-22.
Thiessen, E. D.,
Hill, E. A., & Saffran, J. R. (2005). Infant-directed speech
facilitates word segmentation. Infancy, 7(1), 53-71.
