If the baby’s sensory development begins during pregnancy, some senses are more functional than others at birth. Which meaning comes first? And last? We take stock with Dr. Catherine Salinier, outpatient pediatrician.
Baby’s 5 senses begin to develop very early in utero, from the first weeks of gestation. A development that will continue at birth and until the age of 6 years. Unlike the psychomotor acquisitions that are specific to each child, the 5 senses are gradually refined in a very precise order. The point with Dr Catherine Salinier, ambulatory pediatrician, responsible for the “Child psychiatry” and “Adolescent” groups of the AFPA.
Which meaning comes first?
The first sense to develop is touch. Come next taste, smell, hearing and then sight. “When the baby is born and placed on its mother’s belly, all its senses are awakened. Apart from sight, touch, taste, hearing and smell were already present in the fetus. Regarding touch, the fetus sucks its thumb in the mother’s womb and, when they are twins, they touch each other“, remarks Dr. Catherine Salinier.
“When the baby is born and you put it on its mother’s belly, all its senses are awakened”.
Which sense is least developed at birth?
Sight is the least developed sense at birth. Indeed, the baby does not see beyond 30 centimeters.
“When the newborn baby crawls to its mother’s breast, it engages all of its senses. Sight with the areola of the breast, smell and taste with milk, hearing with her mother’s voice, touch with contact, skin to skin. In other words, the 5 senses are already functional at birth, they will then be refined“, informs the pediatrician.
“The 5 senses are already functional at birth, they will then be refined”.
Touch
Touch develops from the second month of pregnancy and by the fourth month, baby’s fingers have receptors. Touch is also the first sense that is most developed at birth. This is why midwives encourage dads and mothers to practice skin to skin, from the first moments after childbirth.
Taste
Taste buds appear on the tongue of the fetus from the 11th week of pregnancy. Since then, discovers flavors through amniotic fluid and already has his preferences! He will also continue this discovery if he is breastfed. “At birth, if a baby is offered a compress soaked in his mother’s or another mother’s milk, he will spontaneously move towards his mother’s“, observes the pediatrician.
The smell
During pregnancy, the fetus is bathed in amniotic fluid. “At birth, if we put compresses of amniotic fluid soaked under the baby’s nose, he will immediately recognize his mother’s amniotic fluid and then at birth will move towards the breast. Thereafter, the baby will be reassured in the presence of a t-shirt impregnated with the smell of his mother“, says our interlocutor.
hearing
Between the 26th and 28th week of amenorrhea, the baby begins to hear the sounds coming from the mother’s digestive system, the beating of his heart. “When we make the baby listen to music in utero and play it again after birth, it will soothe him because he remembers it”adds Dr. Catherine Salinier.
View
Sight is the least developed sense at birth. Initially, baby can’t see further than 30 centimeters, but his sight develops as he grows. It is only at the age of three months that babies manage to recognize the faces of their parents.
Thanks to Dr Catherine Salinier, ambulatory pediatrician, head of the “Pedopsychiatry” and “Adolescent” groups of the AFPA, expert on the Mpedia parenting site