Talking to your baby could change their brain on a cellular level

talk to the children it could help shape the structure of their brains growing, according to new research.

The study, conducted by researchers at the University of East Anglia in the UK, found that children who listened more regularly spoke they have more efficient looking neurons.

“In particular, brain scans have shown that their language processing regions harbored a higher concentration of myelina substance that surrounds and protects neurons and allows them to send messages faster and more efficiently,” said the scientists.

It’s not known whether that extra myelin actually affects a two-and-a-half-year-old’s language skills, but researchers suspect that could have important benefits.

“The myelin has wrapped itself around the neuron. It’s a bit like putting duct tape on a leaky tube. It helps the neuron get more signal from point A to point B, strengthening its connection with other neurons,” explained John Spencer, a cognitive psychologist at the University of East Anglia.

“While there is still a lot to learn Regarding these processes, the message to healthcare professionals is clear: talk to your baby, your baby, your baby,” Spencer added.

“Not only do they listen, but also their linguistic input it is literally molding their brains“. he added.

That message is simple, but it comes with some complex results. In the study, which was published in The Journal of Neuroscience, more is said it did not always promote greater neural efficiency in the children’s brain.

For the study, the researchers they had more than 140 young children use recording devices during three days. In the thousands of hours of audio recordings collected, the researchers were able to hear what the children were listening to every day.

The team then selected just over half of those children for a MRI during sleep the PAN.

Among six-month-olds, greater daily language input was associated with less myelinationexactly the opposite result of what was found in children two years older.

It was unexpected, but as Spencer explained, “the development of the brain of a the baby goes through the stages naturally. Sometimes your brain is busy building new cells, while other times it’s busy refining the cells it has already built.”

In the first few years of life, sheer brain growth seems to take the lead. At two years old, a person has already acquired Brain volume of 80 percent that of an adult.

From that moment they begin the phases of “pruning and cultivation”.

“This suggests that talking matters as much at six months as it does at 30 months, but it affects the brain differently because the brain is in a different ‘state’,” Spencer wrote in an article in The Conversation.

At six months, for example, hearing more language can delay myelination and instead facilitate brain growth. For now, though, that’s just speculation.

Saloni Krishnan, a cognitive developmental neuroscientist who was not involved in the study, told The Guardian. more research is needed understand the role of myelin in learning.

“It is not yet clear whether the increase in myelination in these areas is Significant for future language or cognitive developmentor whether this is a stable pattern throughout childhood,” he said.

Many previous studies have shown that language exposure is important for a child’s language processing, vocabulary, grammar, and verbal reasoning. However, it is still largely unknown how do these skills translate in processes in the brain.

Just hours after birth, babies’ brains show signs that they’re already learning the sounds of speech. And the “baby talk” is associated with better language skills long term.

Additionally, previous studies have found that four- to six-year-olds have more conversations with adults they also show increased myelination in brain regions associated with language.

Source: science