Language Learning

Hespos wanted to see if infants from native English-speaking homes would notice the loose fit/tight fit distinction. She studied 32 five month olds while they watched hands place a cylinder into tight- or loose-fitting containers. "This is a distinction that if you presented adult English speakers with it, they would gloss over the distinction," Hespos explains. "They wouldn't notice it. It's not captured in our language."

Hespos's research builds on previous studies of brain function in infants. Stanislas Dehaene of the French National Institute for Health and Medical Research captured magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) brain scans of two month olds listening to a recording played forward and backward. The scans revealed that babies could tell the difference. "There has been a huge debate as to whether the infant brain is a blank slate," says Dehaene. "What we found is that the brain of the infant is already well organized."

Hespos, who encourages parents to participate in child development research at their local universities, says her study "helps us better understand how babies might be acquiring language. If we can figure out what is typical development, it will lead us to better understand what's atypical development. One of the things that this study is helping us do is understand what is the developmental process in developing language, and once we can understand that better, we can apply it to atypical populations."

This research appeared in the July 22, 2004 issue of Nature and was funded by the National Institutes of Health.