Motherese

A study has found that Rhesus monkeys make unique vocalizations to interact with infants

Baby talk, also referred to as "motherese", "parentese", or "mommy talk," is a nonstandard form of speech used by adults in talking to toddlers and infants. It is usually delivered with a "cooing" pattern of intonation different from that of normal adult speech: high in pitch, with many glissando variations that are more pronounced than those of normal speech. Baby talk is also characterized by the shortening and simplifying of words. Baby talk is also used by people when talking to their pets, and between adults as a form of affection, intimacy, bullying or patronising.

Studies have shown that infants actually prefer to listen to this type of speech.^[6] Some researchers, including Rima Shore (1997), believe that baby talk is an important part of the emotional bonding process. Shore and other researchers believe that baby talk contributes to mental development, as it helps teach the child the basic function and structure of language. Studies have found that responding to an infant's babble with meaningless babble aids the infant's development; while the babble has no logical meaning, the verbal interaction demonstrates to the child the bidirectional nature of speech, and the importance of verbal feedback.

She ain't talkin in motherese

Some researchers have pointed out that baby talk is not universal among the world's cultures, and argue that its role in "helping children learn grammar" has been overestimated. In some societies (such as certain Samoan tribes; see first reference) adults do not speak to their children until the children reach a certain age. In other societies, it is more common to speak to children as one would to an adult, but with simplifications in grammar and vocabulary. In any case, the normal child will eventually acquire the local language without difficulty, regardless of the degree of exposure to baby talk. However, the use of motherese could have an important role in affecting the rate and quality of language acquisition.

Some examples of widely-used baby talk words and phrases in English, many of which are not found within standard dictionaries, include:

• beddy-bye (go to bed, sleeping, bedtime)
• blankie (blanket)
• boo-boo (wound or bruise)
• dada (dad, daddy)
• din-din (dinner)
• doedoes (In South African English, the equivalent of beddy-bye)
• num nums (food/dinner)
• ickle (little (chiefly British))
• icky (disgusting)
• jammies (pajamas)
• nana (grandmother)
• oopsie-daisy (small accident)
• owie (wound or bruise)

HELLO kitty

Moreover, many words can be derived into baby talk following certain rules of transformation, in English adding a terminal /i/ sound is a common way to form a diminutive which is used as part of baby talk, examples include:

• horsey (from horse)
• kitty (from cat or kitten)
• potty (originally from pot now equivalent to modern toilet)
• doggy (from dog)

("Puppy" is often erroneously thought to be a diminutive of pup made this way, but it is in fact the other way around: pup is a shortening of puppy, which comes from French popi or poupée meaning doll.)

Other transformations mimic the way infants mistake certain consonants which in English can include turning /l/ into /w/ as in wuv from love or widdo from little or in pronouncing /v/ as /b/ and /ð/ or /t/ as /d/.

Noooo eloongaaateeed voooweeels foooohr meehh

Still other transformations, but not in all languages, include elongated vowels, such as kitty and kiiiitty, meaning the same thing. While this is understood by English speaking toddlers, it is not applicable with Dutch toddlers as they learn that elongated vowels reference different words.