How babies recognise and then remember people
Your baby may be surrounded by a large family, or their circle might be a little smaller. There will be people your baby will see every day and will be showing warmth and affection towards. For example, they might be settled by your touch, or just seeing you, or might kick with excitement when hearing your voice.
There are other people who will bond with your baby even though they are not involved in their daily lives. This could be grandparents, aunties, uncles, or your best friend. You may start to observe your baby recognising these people, despite not seeing them every day. When they see them, they might smile, or turn towards them when they hear their voice. They might also settle with these familiar people when they hadn’t done so previously.[1]
How do babies begin to recognise others?
Your baby’s senses develop before birth, and they will have heard the voices of the people around them. They will have recognised their mother’s voice and smell when they were born and have used their senses to begin to recognise the people they see regularly.
As their vision develops, your baby will begin to recognise other people based on facial features.[2] For example, they are more likely to notice someone who has a distinctive hair colour, or wears glasses or bright lipstick when they come to visit.
At birth, babies have limited colour discrimination abilities, but now these will have developed further, and they will be more able to distinguish features. Your baby will now also be able to focus on people and objects that are further away, and they will be able to focus with greater accuracy than before.[3]
Remembering people's features
As well as visual skills, your baby is developing their memory. As your baby is developing their early memory, so they will start to remember some features that stand out to them in familiar people.[4]
Your baby will also start to remember more people who are not immediate family members, such as aunts and uncles, or close family friends. They may show excitement when they see these people or hear their voices.
References:
[1] Jelen, M. & Smith, V. (2008). Parent/Caregiver Narrative: Social and Emotional Development 4 – 6 Months. In L.M. Phillips (Ed.), Handbook of language and literacy development: A Roadmap from 0 - 60 Months. [online], pp. 1 - 9. London, ON: Canadian Language and Literacy Research Network. Available at: Handbook of language and literacy development
[2] Klass, P. (2018). How Children Learn to Recognize Faces. Available: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/29/well/family/how-children-learn-to-recognize-faces.html.
[3] Shankar, S., Robertson, B-A., & Bobier, W.R. (2007). Parent/Caregiver Narrative: Vision Development (0 - 6 Months). In L.M. Phillips (Ed.), Handbook of language and literacy development: A Roadmap from 0 - 60 Months. [online], pp. 1 - 5. London, ON: Canadian Language and Literacy Research Network. Available at: Handbook of language and literacy development
[4] Samuels, C.A., Butterworth, G., Roberts. T. Graupner T, & Hole, G. (2013), Facial Aesthetics: Babies Prefer Attractiveness to Symmetry, Department of Psychology, University of New England, Armidale, New South Wales 2351, Australia
Division of Psychology, University of Sussex, Brighton BN1 9QU, UK, Department of Psychology, University of Southampton, Southampton, UK