124. Babies can recognize their moms’ voices in the womb

Research has shown that babies can hear sounds at 30 weeks. Additionally, more recent research going on concurrently in China and Canada has found that babies can discern between different voices. There’s a marked in the baby’s heart rate between listening to a stranger’s voice and listening to his/her mother’s. Babies in the womb react to hearing their mothers by increasing their heart rate. When listening to a stranger, their heart rate actually decreases. The same research found that before being born, babies are able to discriminate different sounds in any language, an ability they lose as they get older and learn their first language.