Babies’ cries can render humans physically hotter, research finds

Babies’ cries can render humans physically hotter, research finds
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Babies’ cries can make a person’s body temperature rise, a new study has found. According to research from the University of Saint-Etienne and reported in The Guardian, the cry of a distressed infant can cause an automatic emotional response that leads to a rush of blood to the face, causing a physical rise in temperature in both men and women.

The study, which used a thermal camera to film volunteers’ faces while they listened to recordings of babies crying, found that the effect was more pronounced and synchronized when the cries were more distressed. The researchers noted that when babies are in real pain, their cries contain what they call “acoustic roughness,” which is what triggered the greatest change in temperature in the adults. This finding suggests that humans are emotionally sensitive to these specific acoustic features, which helps them distinguish between a baby that is simply unhappy and one that is in actual pain.