Fascinating Facts about Newborn Babies
Expecting a newborn baby can be very overwhelming and exciting! And when they finally come, we cannot help but admire how much of an absolute beauty they are. Babies are adorable, fragile, innocent little humans that are also extremely complex.
Did you know that the only sound newborns recognize at birth is their mother’s voice and that newborns breathe thrice as fast as adults do? There are lots of other fascinating facts about newborn babies that you probably didn’t know and we have put together a handful of them here, for your reading pleasure.
1. Babies have 300 bones, which is 94 more bones than an adult has. As they grow up, some of these bones fuse together.
2. Newborns are shortsighted and can only see about 20cm -30cm in front of their faces. Everything else is a blurry sight of shapes and shadows.
3. Learning to talk begins from the womb, as babies can hear their mother’s voice and other sounds from about 23 weeks of pregnancy.
4. A newborn’s stomach is as tiny as a hazelnut which is why they need to feed often and will urinate or poo often too.
5. A newborn’s first poo is made up of a dark, sticky, non-smelly substance called meconium.
6. Babies are born with the aquatic instincts and reflexes that enable them to hold their breath underwater, although they will overgrow this ability while they get older.
7. Birthmarks are common among babies, some of which may fade within a few years, while some of which may be a sign of a medical condition.
8. While sleeping, newborn babies might pause without a breath for only about 5-10 seconds.
9. Newborns tend to like the same foods their mothers ate while they were in the womb.
10. Newborn babies cry, but not with tears in their eyes until they are about 2-3 months old.
11. Newborns are born with enlarged breasts;- small firm lumps on their chests that form as a result of absorbed estrogen while in the womb.
12. About 5% of newborn babies can lactate too, i.e. they produce tiny amounts of milk from their breast buds which develops as a result of the quick drop in estrogen after they are born.
13. Newborn baby girls can also get a mini period or vaginal discharge which would normally last for a few days.
14. 85% of newborns will prefer to turn their heads to the right when lying on their back.
15. Newborn baby boys get erections too. You will notice this happens right before they pee.
16. Newborns don’t have kneecaps until about the age of 3 and 5.
17. Babies go through a whopping amount of over 3000 napkins in their first year!
18. Red is the first color that newborn babies recognize, although they can only see in black and white for the first 3 months of their life.
19. Babies double their birth weight by approximately 5 months old and triple it when they are a year old.
20. Babies have sensitive touch receptors in almost all corners of their mouths.
21. A newborn baby’s skull has a lot of bones in it that overlap one another during birth to help the baby squeeze out.
22. Babies have many known reflexes which are primitive, due to evolution and help in the development of certain skills.
23. Newborn babies sleep for approximately 16-20 hours a day in their first year.
24. Babies do cry in accents! This is because newborns pick up their mother’s native tongue in the last three months of pregnancy and so they have the ability to use what they heard in the womb to then control their cries.
25. The more physically babies interact is the better they’ll verbally communicate in the future.
26. Babies are not born with self-awareness.
27. Babies prefer high-pitched voices more than low-pitched voices, and so you may get a better response when you talk to a baby in higher-pitched voice tones.
28. A baby is not born with a proportionate body. The head makes up about a quarter of the total body length and the brain makes up 10% of the total body weight.
29. Some researchers suggest that the shaking gesture of the head to mean “no” comes from babies, which means that a baby is learning and developing its protective reflexes.
30. A baby is born with just about one cup (240ml) of blood in their body.
31. Research shows that babies who are breastfed for the first three months have 30% more cognitive development than babies who are formula-fed.
32. Every year, 7000 babies in the United States suffer due to SIDS (Sudden Infant Death Syndrome).
33. Babies forget everything that they lived and experienced in the first 3 years of their lives. Neuroscientists call it “infantile amnesia”.
34. Premature babies of less than 32 weeks gestation do not sweat initially when they are born.
35. It takes a newborn about 5-10 minutes to get used to something new in their environment. When they’re about 3 months old, they are able to adapt between 30 seconds and 2 minutes.
36. A baby’s smile is instinctive and not from watching and learning, because even blind babies smile!
37. Babies are music lovers. They remain calm twice as long when listening to a song than they do when listening to a speech.
38. While in the womb, babies’ bodies are covered in a thin layer of hair called lanugo.
39. Babies will be soothed by sounds that remind them of the rhythmic sounds they hear in the womb, like their mother’s heartbeat or the sound of a vacuum cleaner.
40. Newborns do not know the difference between daytime and nighttime and so their sleep schedules can be completely reversed.
41. A newborn baby boy’s brain grows 8% faster than a baby girl’s own, especially the parts of the brain that controls movement and coordination.
42. Babies can breathe and swallow at the same time until 7 months of age. Something we would never be able to do as adults.
43. Statistics show that parents of newborns miss out on 6 months of sleep in the first 2 years of their child’s life.
44. Breastfed babies poop more frequently and easily than formula-fed babies because breastmilk is a natural laxative.
45. Babies who stare at themselves in front of a mirror do not realize it is their own reflection until they are around 18 months old.
46. A baby’s brain will speed its growth size to adult size by their first birthday.
47. A newborn baby will urinate as often as every 20 minutes because they have uncontrollable bladders that can only hold about one tablespoon (15 ml) of urine.
48. In China, there is a baby born with a birth defect every, and only 20-30% of these infants can be helped.
49. Surprisingly, newborn babies have grips that are strong enough for them to dangle midair.
50. The heaviest baby ever born and survived, weighed 22lbs.
51. One out of 8 babies are born prematurely in the United States. This estimates to be over half a million premature babies in the United States each year.
52. Normally, babies are born between 7-8lbs. But the smallest surviving baby ever born weighed 8.5 lbs.
53. Human babies are the only primates that smile at their mother or father.
54. If a mother has an STD during pregnancy, it can result in birthing a baby with low birth weight, or with chronic diseases.
55. Babies sneeze a lot and it is not because of a cold but as a way of clearing their nasal and respiratory passages.
56. You may not realize it but babies lose their birth hair within 3-4 months old, and a whole new head of hair grows back in its place.
57. According to the United Nations, there are approximately 385,000 births that take place every day in the world.
58. Newborn babies have big eyes. And as it turns out, babies’ eyes are already 75% the size of their adult eyes!
59. Most children will lose their hearing later on as they grow up. 2 out of 1000 children in the United States are born deaf.
60. A newborn’s umbilical cord falls off within 1-2 weeks after they are born.
61. Newborn babies have shallow fingerprints that become prominent after 6 months of age.
Hope you enjoyed these interesting facts about newborn babies. Please leave a comment and share it with your friends. Do you know that your brain can generate enough electricity to power a small light bulb? Please check out more 83 Surprising and Fun Human Body Facts