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Fetuses respond to father's voice but prefer mother's voice after birth
Author(s) -
Lee Grace Y.,
Kisilevsky Barbara S.
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
developmental psychobiology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.055
H-Index - 93
eISSN - 1098-2302
pISSN - 0012-1630
DOI - 10.1002/dev.21084
Subject(s) - audiology , sound (geography) , psychology , fetal heart rate , fetus , developmental psychology , heart rate , medicine , communication , pregnancy , acoustics , physics , biology , blood pressure , genetics
Fetal and newborn responding to audio‐recordings of their father's versus mother's reading a story were examined. At home, fathers read a different story to the fetus each day for 7 days. Subsequently, in the laboratory, continuous fetal heart rate was recorded during a 9 min protocol, including three, 3 min periods: baseline no‐sound, voice (mother or father), postvoice no‐sound. Following a 20 min delay, the opposite voice was delivered. Newborn head‐turning was observed on 20 s trials: three no‐sound, three voice (mother or father), three opposite voice, three no‐sound trials with the same segment of each parent's recording. Fetuses showed a heart rate increase to both voices which was sustained over the voice period. Consistent with prior reports, newborns showed a preference for their mother's but not their father's voice. The characteristics of voice stimuli that capture fetal attention and elicit a response are yet to be identified. © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Dev Psychobiol 56: 1–11, 2014.