PASSAGE 2
Read the text and answer questions 14 – 26
Babies cry in their mother tongue
A newborn baby's cry may sound the same to the ears of sleep-deprived parents
the world over but, say scientists, comparisons of babies a few days old show that
the cry of a newborn shares similarities with the language its parents speak. The
reason for this is presumably the different intonation patterns in their native
languages, which are already perceived in the uterus and are later reproduced
A It is already known that human foetuses become attentive listeners in the final
trimester of pregnancy. 'The mother's voice in particular is sensed early on,'
explains Professor Amelia Finlayson of the Institute for Human Cognitive and
Brain Sciences in Leipzig. 'Human foetuses perceive information filtered at around
400 hertz, but they cannot hear the actual words. It is a bit like holding your head
under water when someone is talking next to the bath.'
B Finlayson's research indicates that newborn babies probably cannot distinguish
between the accents of Welsh and Northern Scottish people or between Low
German and Upper Bavarian, but they can recognise major differences in the
intonation patterns of their respective mother tongues. The Leipzig researchers
showed that in an earlier experiment, by means of physiological studies of babies
of three to four months of age. For that study, the babies had hoods with electrodes
put on their heads, and had recordings of different intonation patterns played to
them. The children's brainwaves reacted to the differences even when they were
asleep.
C At the same time, Doctor Katya Williams of the University of Wurzburg first
suggested in her PhD thesis that babies' crying might be a stage in their linguistic
development. Said Williams: 'It used to be thought that a baby's cry was just a
signal of alarm to call its mother. This assumption was corrected when we noticed
that the cries are not the same from week to week. What biological purpose would
that have? If a fire siren sounded different every day, we would not even recognise
it!'
D The question thus presented itself as to whether babies' cries already showed the
intonation patterns of their different mother tongues. To study this, the Leipzig
brain researchers and the 'screaming researchers' of the University of Wurzburg
worked in collaboration with their colleagues at the Laboratory of Cognitive
Sciences and Linguistics, at the Ecole Normale Superieure in Paris, to devise a new
experiment. German and French babies were selected for the comparison because
the differences in the intonation shapes of these two mother tongues are
particularly pronounced. For example, the German word Papa is Papa in French.
E These three research groups made a comparison of recordings of 60 healthy
newborns aged between two and five days old: 30 infants born into French-
speaking families and 30 born into German-speaking families. Whenever the
babies were hungry or thirsty or simply wanted their mothers and announced the
fact by crying, the researchers were at the ready with their microphones and
recorded their complaints. More than 20 hours of recordings of babies' crying were
then fed into a computer for the purpose of analysis.
F The amazing result, published in the journal Modern Biology, is that just a few
days after birth, babies use the acoustic input they perceive in the uterus to adapt
their linguistic production to their target mother tongue. The melody of the German
babies' screams usually began loudly and at a high pitch and then followed a
downward curve, while the French babies more often screamed with a rising
melody contour. Thus, they reproduce precisely the intonation patterns that are
characteristic of their respective mother tongues. This proves, says the team of
researchers, that babies' cries are attempts to communicate specifically with their
mothers. 'Newborns are probably highly motivated to imitate their mother's
behaviour in order to attract her and foster bonding and therefore physical
nourishment,' they wrote. 'Because melody contour may be the only aspect of their
mother's speech that newborns are able to imitate, this might explain why we found
melody contour imitation at that early age.' This finding is interesting because it
suggests that babies are producing sounds they have heard in the womb, meaning
that this is learning rather than an innate behaviour.
G Furthermore, the findings are consistent with the hypothesis that linguistic
development does not just begin from the age of nine to ten months, with the first
babbling resembling language such as 'mam- mam-mam' or 'ba-ba-ba', but with the
very first sounds that babies produce. 'We are born to learn language. And that
starts right away,' says Dr Katya Williams. Dr Williams' colleague, Mr Walter
Meade, discovered that this initial sensitivity to the melodic features of language
assists infants to subsequently learn their mother tongue. 'The melodic patterns
practised in crying are building blocks for eventual sound production, such as
gurgling and babbling, right up to the first words and sentences,' says Meade.
H The results also demonstrated once again how language distinguishes human
infants from all other primates. According to Williams, among baby chimpanzees,
the 'crying melody' is closely associated with the build-up and reduction of
pressure in the lungs, and is not generated by a mental process. 'In comparison with
the sounds of other primates, the cries of a newborn human baby display a fantastic
repertoire of melodic and rhythmic variations,' she adds. 'Our babies are expert
vocalists in comparison with all the other animals. Could that offer some small
consolation for nerve-wracked parents?'
Questions 14–19
Reading Passage 2 has eight paragraphs, A-H.
Which paragraph contains the following information?
Choose the correct letter, A-H, in boxes 14-19.
NB You may use any letter more than once.
14 a description of the methodology of an experiment carried out by several
research institutes
15 the rationale for choosing the participants of an experiment
16 a suggestion that babies are driven to copy their mothers to gain food
17 an account of the methodology of a past experiment carried out by the Leipzig
researchers
18 an illustration of the limitation of babies' ability to hear inside the womb
19 an assertion that babies of different nationalities cry with different intonation
Questions 20–23
Look at the following statements (Questions 20-23) and the list of researchers
below.
Match each statement with the correct researcher, A, B, or C.
Choose the correct letter, A, B, or C, in boxes 20-23.
NB You may use any letter more than once.
Lists of reseachers
A. Professor Amelia Finlayson
B. Doctor Katya Williams
C. Mr Walter Meade
20 Important everyday sounds must remain consistent in order to be understood.
21 The different tones used in crying help babies to learn language later on.
22 The tune of young primates’ cries is created by their breathing, not their brain.
23 Unborn babies in the womb are focused on the voice of one specific person.
Questions 24–26
Complete the sentences below.
Write ONE WORD ONLY from the passage for each answer.
Professor Amelia Finlayson doubts unborn babies can recognise
different 24___________.
In the first Leipzig experiment, the 25___________ of babies changed upon
hearing different intonation patterns.
Early scientists believed that babies cried for no other reason than as
a 26___________ that they wanted their parents.