新奇事件簿 世界各地妈妈对孩子说话语调相同

A new study has found that mothers all over the world speak to their babies in the same way. The research is from the Baby Lab at Princeton University in the USA. The researchers who did the study said "motherese" is a universal language. They said baby talk is not just lots of cute noises and coochy-coos. The words and sounds that mothers say to their babies are quite complex. They form a special form of communication that mothers use in the same way across the world. These sounds are very important in helping¹ the language development in infants. Dr Elise Piazza², co-author of the research, said baby talk is a lot more important than we thought. She said: "It is not something to be embarrassed about at all."

一项新的研究发现，世界各地的母亲对婴儿说话的方式都是一样的。这份研究来自美国普林斯顿大学婴儿实验室。研究人员表示，“妈妈语”是世界通用的语言。他们表示，儿语不仅仅是许多可爱的发音和呢喃。母亲对婴儿说的词语和发出的声音非常复杂。它们构成了一种特别的交流方式，世界各地的母亲通用。这些声音对于帮助了解婴儿的语言发展非常重要。该研究联合作者Elise Piazza表示，儿语比我们认为的更加重要。她说：“这完全没有什么好尴尬的。”

The researchers recorded 24 different mothers talking to their babies. The babies were aged³ between seven months and one year. The mothers spoke⁴ to their children in 10 different native languages, including English, Spanish, Mandarin⁵, Russian and Hebrew. Dr Piazza said: "We basically brought mothers into the lab and had them play with and read to their own babies, just like they would at home." She added: "We found that mothers [change the] basic quality of their voices when speaking to infants, and they do so in a [very similar] way across many diverse languages." The study didn't look at fathers' talk, but Piazza said that it is likely fathers would also speak in a similar way across the world.

研究人员录下了24个不同的母亲对婴儿说话。这些婴儿的年龄在7个月到1岁之间。这些母亲用10种不同的方言对婴儿讲话，包括英语，西班牙语，普通话，俄语和希伯来语。Piazza博士表示：“我们只是把母亲们带到实验室里，让她们和自己的宝宝玩，自己跟他们说话，就像在家里一样。”她补充说：“我们发现，母亲在对婴儿说话时会不自觉地改变音量和音调，各种不同的语言都是这样。”这份研究没有分析父亲的语言，但是Piazza表示，世界各地的父亲很有可能也是以类似的方式对婴儿说话。

 

1 helping   

n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的

参考例句：

• The poor children regularly pony up for a second helping of my hamburger. 那些可怜的孩子们总是要求我把我的汉堡包再给他们一份。
• By doing this, they may at times be helping to restore competition. 这样一来, 他在某些时候,有助于竞争的加强。

2 piazza   

n.广场；走廊

参考例句：

• Siena's main piazza was one of the sights of Italy.锡耶纳的主要广场是意大利的名胜之一。
• They walked out of the cafeteria,and across the piazzadj.他们走出自助餐厅,穿过广场。

3 aged   

adj.年老的，陈年的

参考例句：

• He had put on weight and aged a little.他胖了，也老点了。
• He is aged,but his memory is still good.他已年老，然而记忆力还好。

4 spoke   

n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说

参考例句：

• They sourced the spoke nuts from our company.他们的轮辐螺帽是从我们公司获得的。
• The spokes of a wheel are the bars that connect the outer ring to the centre.辐条是轮子上连接外圈与中心的条棒。

5 Mandarin   

n.中国官话，国语，满清官吏；adj.华丽辞藻的

参考例句：

• Just over one billion people speak Mandarin as their native tongue.大约有十亿以上的人口以华语为母语。
• Mandarin will be the new official language of the European Union.普通话会变成欧盟新的官方语言。