Q: Why does baby babble sound the same in any language?

A. Actually, that isn't necessarily the case, says Jenny Saffran, who studies infant and child language at UW-Madison's Waisman Center.

On average, babies babble from 6 to 12 months of age, she says, but "scientists currently disagree about whether babble does sound the same in all languages, even from the get- go."

Babble may sound identical across languages, she says, "because babies are making the sounds that are the easiest for their mouths to produce, and this will be the same for all the babies around the globe. It's really hard to get all those muscles working together in the complicated ways needed to form consonants and vowels. Some sounds, like B or G, are easy; 'th' and 'sh' are hard."

Then, as babble is shaped into early speech, she says, the universal sound disappears.

"At most, babble only sounds the same for the first few months. Then it is shaped by the sounds of the native language," Saffran said.

Gradually, babies who hear English begin making more English sounds, while Russian babies start sounding Russian. Babies who see sign language begin to "babble" with their hands, she said.

Because babbling precedes spoken language, it's tempting to believe babbling babies are trying to communicate, or at least trying to learn to speak. But, Saffran says, "It might just feel good or be fun, like the many other rhythmic things that babies do, like using a rattle or banging a spoon."

- Produced in cooperation with University Communications

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