Editing Infant (section)

=== Language development ===
[[File:A Proper Space Book for Babies (50879866102).jpg|left|thumb|An infant holding a space-themed [[baby book]]]]
Caregivers of an infant are advised to pick up on the infant's facial expressions and mirror them. Reproducing and empathizing with their facial expressions enables infants to experience effectiveness and to recognize their own actions more easily (see [[mirror neuron]]s). Exaggeratedly reproduced facial expressions and gestures are recommended, as they are clearer forms of expression. The baby's babbling should also be picked up and repeated. By imitating each other's sounds the first simple dialogues are initiated.<ref name="Kasten">{{cite web|title=Entwicklungspsychologische Grundlagen der frühen Kindheit und frühpädagogische Konsequenzen|url=https://www.kita-fachtexte.de/fileadmin/Redaktion/Publikationen/KiTaFT_kasten_2014.pdf|last=Hartmut Kasten|language=de|access-date=2020-12-31|archive-date=2020-12-04|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201204225924/https://www.kita-fachtexte.de/fileadmin/Redaktion/Publikationen/KiTaFT_kasten_2014.pdf|url-status=live}}</ref> Accentuated pronunciation and melodic [[Intonation (linguistics)|intonation]] make it easier to recognize individual words in a sentence.<ref>{{cite journal |first1=Erik |last1=Thiessen |first2=Emily |last2=Hill |first3=Jenny |last3=Saffran |journal=Infancy |title=Infant-Directed Speech Facilitates Word Segmentation |volume=7 |issue=1 |pages=53–71 |date=January 2005 |doi=10.1207/s15327078in0701_5
|pmid=33430544}}</ref> However, it is not advisable to use simplified "[[baby talk]]" (e.g. "Did you 'ouch'?" instead of, "Did you hurt yourself?").<ref>{{cite web|work=Gehirn&GeistSerie Kindesentwicklung No. 1 |date=February 2014 |url=https://www.spektrum.de/inhaltsverzeichnis/babys-verstehen-und-foerdern-gehirn-und-geist-serie-kindesentwicklung-nr-1/913150 |title=Püppi, muttu AA machen? |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20200202180540/https://www.spektrum.de/inhaltsverzeichnis/babys-verstehen-und-foerdern-gehirn-und-geist-serie-kindesentwicklung-nr-1/913150 |archivedate=2020-02-02 |page=63}}</ref>

Even if parents cannot yet understand infants' [[babbling]], a timely response by parents to babbling leads to faster language acquisition.<ref name=":0">{{cite web|title=Parents, listen next time your baby babbles|url=https://now.uiowa.edu/2014/08/parents-listen-next-time-your-baby-babbles|date=2014-08-27|access-date=2020-12-31|archive-date=2020-11-27|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201127115705/https://now.uiowa.edu/2014/08/parents-listen-next-time-your-baby-babbles|url-status=live}}</ref> This was confirmed by researchers who first studied mothers' behavior towards 8-month-old infants and later tested the infants' vocabulary when they were 15 months old.<ref name=":1">{{citation|first1=Julie |last1=Gros-Louis |first2=Meredith J. |last2=West |first3=Andrew P. |last3=King |periodical=Infancy|title=Maternal Responsiveness and the Development of Directed Vocalizing in Social Interactions|volume=19|issue=4|at=pp.&nbsp;385–408|date=July 2014 |doi=10.1111/infa.12054
}}</ref> A first important development of infants is the discovery that they can influence their parents through babbling (development of intentional communication).<ref name=":1" /> Parents can encourage this by engaging with their infants in babbling. This in turn promotes further language development, as infants then turn to their parents more often.<ref name=":0" />

Previous studies have shown that the infant's speech is encouraged when parents, for example, smile in the infant's direction or touch the infant every time the infant looks at them and babbles. It also helps if parents respond to what they think their baby is saying (for example, giving a ball or commenting when the baby looks at the ball and babbles).<ref name=":0" /> Responding to sounds produced when the baby looks at an object (object-directed vocalizations) thus provide an opportunity to learn the name of the object. In this way, babies also learn that sounds are associated with objects.<ref name=":1" /> However, language development is only achieved if parents react positively (e.g. smile) in response to the infant's babbling. A high response rate without a connection to the infant's utterances does not lead to language promotion.<ref name=":1" /> It is detrimental to language development if a mother instead tries to divert the infant's attention to something else.<ref name="pmid30387273">{{cite journal | vauthors = Smith J, Levickis P, Eadie T, Bretherton L, Conway L, Goldfeld S | title = Associations between early maternal behaviours and child language at 36 months in a cohort experiencing adversity | journal = International Journal of Language & Communication Disorders | volume = 54 | issue = 1 | pages = 110–122 | date = January 2019 | pmid = 30387273 | doi = 10.1111/1460-6984.12435 | hdl = 11343/284733 | s2cid = 54389163 | hdl-access = free }}</ref>