A lack of evidence in 4-month-old human infants for paternal voice preference

Several studies have found that human infants recognize the sight, sound, s mell, and touch of their mothers. Maternal recognition occurs early in deve lopment, often being influenced by prenatal experiences. In contrast, the d evelopment of infants' recognition of their fathers is not understood. We i nvestigated whether 4-month-old human infants preferrred their fathers' voi ces, in two different speaking contexts. In both Experiments 1 and 2, infan ts were tested with fathers' adult-directed (AD) or infant-directed (ID) sp eech. In all experiments, infants were allowed to listen to recordings of e ither father's or other's voice contingent on their visual attention. Resul ts from the first two experiments showed that infants did not prefer their fathers' voices over unfamiliar male voices. However, in Experiment 3, 4-mo nth-olds showed that they could discriminate the male voices heard in the p revious studies. These data were interpreted as supporting the hypothesis t hat the experiences necessary for the development of maternal preferences a re different from those supporting paternal preferences, and that perhaps m ultimodal cues are necessary for father recognition in infancy. (C) 1999 Jo hn Wiley & Sons, Inc.