Female employees are asking for longer maternity leave should they give birth to a second child. (Photo : Reuters)
Researchers discovered in a new study that babies were calmed down for twice as long while listening to a song, even if it was in a new language, than when hearing speech. The babies seemed to be "carried away" by the soothing music they heard, which could mean their brains have the ability to be very interested in it like adults are.
The study was published in the journal Infancy. It was conducted by the University of Montreal.
Their goal was to learn how singing and speech affected a baby's emotional self-control. The theory of Professor Isabelle Peretz's research team is that singing helps to develop it.
In the psychologists' experiment, 30 healthy infants listened to baby talk, adult-directed speech, and Turkish "play" songs. Researchers played the recordings until the babies made a "cry face" showing they were unhappy.
While listening to the unknown Turkish song, the babies stayed calm for an average of about nine minutes, according to Daily Mail. Baby-talk kept the babies peaceful for a little over four minutes. Finally, adult-directed speech made the babies calm for a little below four minutes.
Then the researchers let a different group of infants listen to recordings of mothers singing songs in French, the language the babes were used to. They produced the same results as the Turkish songs.
Western mothers usually speak more often than sing to their babies. However, the infants can then miss out on some emotional benefits of hearing singing.
The singing can also benefit the parents. When babies keep crying it can cause the parents to become angry and frustrated, and maybe respond in an uncaring way.
Past studies have shown that music can lower stress, reduce pain, and keep brains alert. In fact, it excites more parts of the brain than all other human functions, according to The Huffington Post.
