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Updated: May 22, 2025
Infant Auditory Processing and Event-related Brain Oscillations
Published on: July 1, 2015
Rhythmicity in Newborn Cry: From an Amplitude Modulation Perspective
Yufang Ruan1, Peter Wermke2, Nai Ding3
1College of Education, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China, y.ruan@zju.edu.cn.
Introduction:
Newborn cries exhibit a richness of melody and rhythmicity, yet their rhythmic features have been less studied.
Methods:
In this study, we analyzed the amplitude modulation of 1,884 cries from 30 Chinese newborns.
Results:
The group-averaged amplitude modulation spectrum revealed an evident increase in energy between 0.5 and 8 Hz, peaking around 2 Hz. The peak frequency for an individual child averaged at around 3 Hz (SD = 1.3 Hz), with the majority lying below 5 Hz.
Conclusion:
This study is the first to demonstrate that newborn cries contain increased energy in slower rate amplitude modulation frequencies associated with prosodic feet and syllabic rhythms in speech, underscoring the important role of rhythmic information in early language acquisition.
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