Can babies get confused who their mom is

Table of Contents Show

Babies Recognise Their Mom First
When Do Babies Start to Recognise Their Fathers?
Determining When a Baby Begins to Identify People
What About Looks When It Comes to Recognizing People?
Effects of Unfamiliar Faces
Things to Remember
Newborn preference for mother

Your bundle of joy is finally in your arms – you’re probably wondering whether or not your little one recognises you! Well, the fact of the matter is that babies are naturally drawn towards faces, and they prefer to observe human faces over other things. In the following article, we shall discuss when babies recognise their mother, father, and other familiar people.

Babies Recognise Their Mom First

A newborn baby feels more comfortable around the mother because not only is the mother’s scent and voice familiar, but the baby also sees more of her all through the day. In most cases, a baby gets to be with the mother a lot more than other members of the family, which is why babies recognise their mothers first. By the time a baby turns three months old and can distinguish between various faces, she may become wary of strangers and unknown faces. So, the question remains – do babies know their mother at birth? Well, that is still debatable, but a mother is certainly amongst the first few people that a newborn baby gets familiarised with.

When Do Babies Start to Recognise Their Fathers?

There are no studies that analyse when babies start to recognise their fathers. However, it is believed that babies do respond and recognise their father’s voice from the womb. For this very reason, many doctors highly recommended that the would-be-dads talk to their babies when in the womb. Babies are born with blurry vision, and by the time they are a few weeks old (in most cases by the time babies turn two) they are most likely to recognise both their parents’ faces.

Determining When a Baby Begins to Identify People

While there is no concrete evidence that helps parents understand when their baby can begin identifying people, some research signifies that a baby can recognise a mother’s face early in life as compared to other people and things, which usually takes longer. A baby can recognise her parents’ faces fairly early, but it takes a couple of months or a year to get familiar with other family members and close friends. The baby may familiarise herself with family members she sees regularly quicker as compared to distant relatives who do not visit often.

What About Looks When It Comes to Recognizing People?

Just the way adults find good-looking people more attractive, babies also find beautiful people more appealing. You may find your baby staring or looking longer at faces that she may find more attractive than others. This is because babies are also fascinated by certain kinds of faces.

In a study conducted in 2017, researchers found that babies are capable of having preferences of faces they like to see even before they are born – these preferences are present right from the womb! In the study, 39 fetuses at 34 weeks gestation were observed – 2 visual stimuli representing face shapes were projected on the mother’s womb, out of which one was inverted. The movement of the head of the foetus was observed using high-quality 4-D sound. It was observed that the foetus moved its head to track the projection of the face shape, but did not do so for the inverted one. This proved that the foetus did not move its head to recognise a pattern, but to the shape it found appealing!

Effects of Unfamiliar Faces

You may experience that your baby is happy and playful in your or your family’s company, but behaves erratically in front of strangers. This is because your baby feels comfortable and cosy with familiar faces and is wary of unfamiliar faces. Unfamiliar faces or strangers may make your baby inquisitive and apprehensive, making her behave strangely. This does not necessarily mean she is anxious or scared, but unfamiliar faces may make your baby uncomfortable.

Things to Remember

Babies are born with the innate quality of bonding with people. Though there is no scientific evidence to prove that, it is certain that babies recognise people much quicker than they recognise places – this happens because their vision is still developing. By 3-4 months of age, a baby recognises the parents, and the vision keeps improving with each passing month. If you notice that your baby is not recognising people and places by 4 months of age, you may want to mention it to your paediatrician. It is better to bring any susceptible vision problems to your doctor’s notice at the earliest, for timely medical intervention.

If you are first-time parents, you may desperately want to know when your baby will be able to recognise you. The best thing that you can do as a parent is to have patience – by the time she is a few months old, you will see your bundle of joy smiling at you!

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Babies do not start showing a preference for mom until later than you think.

A misconception often entertained by rookie psychology students is that babies develop a very quick psychological connection to their mothers, perhaps within hours or days of birth.

The reality is, though, that newborn babies don’t have much of a clue what’s going on right after birth.

Although mother (and father) are likely to very quickly form close attachments to their offspring, from the baby’s perspective it takes longer, much longer.

Newborn babies do not begin to prefer mother, father or anyone at first.

In fact, it usually takes infants until they’re about 2 or 3 months old before they start to show a strong preference for mother, father or anyone.

While a baby is primed for social interaction soon after birth, its abilities are pretty limited.

Here’s the timeline (Simpson, 1999):

After 16 hours babies prefer the sound of human language to other noises (at least they start making rhythmic body movements which psychologists assume means they’re excited). But they don’t show any preference for particular voices.
After 2 days babies can tell the difference between their mothers’ faces and that of a stranger, but they still appear to show no preference.
After 3 days babies clearly prefer human voices, especially their mother’s.
After 3-5 weeks babies become especially interested in faces, and particularly in their mother’s eyes.

Overall, though, the preference for the mother (or other caregiver) is usually fairly weak at first.

Real communication from the baby’s perspective probably doesn’t begin until they’re about 3 or 4 months old.

At around that time they start to initiate social contact with their mothers.

Only between about 3 and 7 months of age do babies start to show a strong preference for mothers, fathers or members of their own family in general.

Newborn preference for mother

This misconception that babies show a preference for mothers very quickly may stem from the study of other animals.

Famously, ducks and geese will ‘imprint on’ and follow around the first thing they see after they hatch.

Konrad Lorenz, a pioneer in ethology (animal psychology) found that newly born geese would imprint on him, then try to follow him everywhere, as though he were their mother.

Babies are much more fickle and probably wouldn’t follow you anywhere, even if they could.

The misconception might also stem from a confusion with research from the 1970s that found there was a critical ‘sensitive period’ shortly after birth that was particularly important for bonding between mother and baby.

Again, this research refers to the mother’s bonding with the baby and not vice versa.

Also, as later researchers have pointed out, this so-called critical period turns out not to be that critical at all.

Attachment between mother, father or another caregiver and child can successfully be done at a later stage, just as well as early on.

→ This post is part of a series on 10 myths about the mind.