Do Newborns Cry in Different Languages?



According to one study, yes.

It’s been known that human fetuses have some degree of “semi” linguistic interaction with the world outside the womb. For example, studies have shown that newborns prefer the sound of their mothers’ voice over other voices, presumably because that voice has been audible in the womb.

But this study goes further and suggests linguistic development in the womb. Languages have distinctive melody contours - patterns of rising or falling intonation that, in a general way, are characteristic of the rhythm of the language. And those melodies can be heard in the cries of newborns.

Newborns haven’t developed enough physiologically to actually produce speech sounds, but boy can they cry. And this study claims that French newborns cry with a rising intonation, and German newborns cry with a falling intonation, characteristic of the general melody contours of those languages. If the data is being correctly interpreted, and of course further study will be needed to determine that, then linguistic development begins much earlier than has been thought.