Listening to Music Can Boost Babies’ Learning Skills

Playing music to babies may help them learn faster by recognizing speech and sounds better, said a new study. In the study, published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, scientists from the University of Washington’s Institute for Learning & Brain Sciences conducting a brain testing session among two groups of babies.

One group of babies were made to play with drums, toys, cars and other fun stuff for 15 minutes without playing any music. While the other group was subjected to the same but music was played along with it.

After the 15 minutes, researchers tracked the brain changes and found that babies in the music group showed stronger brain responses to changes in speech and music when they underwent tests, suggesting they were better able to detect patterns in sounds.

"In both the music and control groups, we gave babies experiences that were social, required their active involvement and included body movements - these are all characteristics that we know help people learn," said lead author Christina Zhao. "The key difference between the play groups was whether the babies were moving to learn a musical rhythm."

Source-Medindia