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Making faces babies can not yet imitate facial expressions
It's amazing how much and how fast babies learn. Even the gestures of adults are imitated. At least many parents think when they make faces in front of the cradle and think that their offspring is following them. However, researchers have now found that the little ones are probably not able to do so.
Newborns can not imitate facial expressions
Couples who have become parents for the first time are often busy concentrating on the baby in the first few weeks. Although most people are aware that babies are babbling through baby talk, many still do not allow themselves to be deterred from doing "dozen or ten" or "making bubble". In addition, grimaces are cut in front of the cots, because it looks so cute when the little ones imitate the gestures. But apparently the offspring is not even capable of doing so: according to the latest findings, babies can not imitate facial expressions. You have to learn this skill first.
Adults like to make faces in front of the cot, because it's so cute when babies mimic the expression. It seems so. In fact, the little ones are not even able to do so. (Image: Alexandr Vasilyev / fotolia.com) Ability is not given to babies in the cradle
Apparently, the ability to imitate gestures and facial expressions has not been born to babies. While they are very interested in what their counterparts are doing during the first few months, they are by no means capable of imitating grimaces, hand movements or noises. As Spiegel reports online, researchers led by Janine Oostenbroek and Virginia Slaughter of the University of Queensland (Australia) examined 106 babies aged one, two, six, and nine weeks each to imitate pre-facial expressions or gestures. "The results were clear and clear: The children did not imitate any of the behaviors they saw," the researchers wrote in the journal Current Biology..
Learned behavior in the first months of life
"Numerous studies from the 1980s and 90s have not suggested imitation of newborns, others, in turn," said Slaughter, according to a report from the Internet portal "Science Daily". "We wanted to sort out the confusion because the 'fact' that imitates newborn babies is often cited, not only in the fields of psychology, neuroscience, and pediatrics, but also in popular sources for parents." According to the "mirror," the likelihood that newborns had an identical grimace had been as high in the current study as any other. The study also pointed out that imitation is not an innate but a learned behavior in the first months of life.
Excitement at the sight of an adult
Crucial to the fact that many studies in the past came to the conclusion that even newborns can mimic gestures and facial expressions, according to Slaughter was above all the very limited choice of pre-made expressions in the earlier studies. According to this, the "forerunners" often just stuck out their tongues or opened their mouths. "When children also arch their tongues, when an adult makes a happy face or points with his fingers, it is not a case of imitation, but probably excitement at the sight of an adult doing something interesting," said Slaughter. The research team therefore used a significantly larger number of very different gestures and expressions, which were shown to the little ones for 60 seconds each.
Investigation did not suggest deliberate imitation
Besides outstretched tongue and open mouth, a sad face and a smile were among the eleven behaviors. Furthermore, two gestures (finger pointing and gripping) and three sounds ("mmm", "eee", "click") were added. And with two objects, hand gestures were imitated: a spoon out of a tube (as a finger copy) and a closing box (as a correspondence to the gripping), so the "mirror". As the scientists explained, many of the 106 babies had fallen asleep on individual tests or started screaming. Therefore, only the records of 64 to 90 of the children were evaluated. Not a single one suggested intentional imitation.
Parents imitate the facial expressions and gestures of their babies
Slaughter explained that in reality it is often the case that parents are the first to imitate the facial expressions and gestures of their little ones. Their evaluation has shown that this happens on average once a couple of minutes when dealing with the baby. In this way the children probably learned to link their own expressions with those of others - and finally to imitate them. "The results should be uplifting news for those who have been waiting in vain for their newborn to imitate them," the researchers conclude. "That's perfectly normal - and at some point, almost everyone will start with it." They assume that this may only happen at the age of six to eight months. Further evaluations are now to show exactly when. The study results from previous studies were also doubted years ago by scientists. For example, Elizabeth Ray of University College London and Cecilia Heyes of the University of Oxford in the 2011 edition of Developmental Science wrote that both the methodology of the analysis and the interpretation of the observations were to be criticized. (Ad)