Twins are regularly reported to invent languages of their own, unintelligible to others. These languages are known as autonomous languages,
Twins are especially likely to maintain an invented language because they spend so much time together and are on the same developmental schedule. They imitate and reinforce each other's early inventions, weakening each other's incentive to learn the mother tongue.
On the whole, language development among twins has been found to be about 1.7 months behind single babies at 20-months-old and 3.1 months behind at 3 years of age. There's even a name for this phenomenon: The “twinning effect.”
Cryptophasia is a phenomenon of a language developed by twins (identical or fraternal) that only the two children can understand. The word has its roots from the Greek crypto-, meaning secret, and -phasia, meaning speech.
Even before very young twins learn language, they can and will communicate non-verbally by looking at each other, staying close together, or hitting each other—and of course playing with each other. It is common to see twins walking hand in hand to school or when shopping with their parents.
It is likely that twins' awareness of one another starts sooner than seven or eight months of age. An article by the late doctor, T. Berry Brazelton, observed that at age three to four months, an infant identical female twin seemed disoriented when her sister was removed from the room.
Young twins are together nearly all the time, and like any two people who spend most of their time together, they learn to rely on nonverbal or shorthand forms of communication. They're able to act intuitively, understanding each other's gestures, grunts, or vocalizations.
They are the result of one fertilized egg splitting into two, giving them identical DNA. (Fraternal twins are the result of two separate, genetically different fertilized eggs.) As a result, identical twins are as close as two people can be. They can speak in unison (it's weird at first, then charming).
Twin Speech Delays
For example, twins sometimes have less language stimulation compared to single-born children because they end up sharing the attention of their parents/teachers/caregivers. Twins also get less one-on-one time with their families than single children do.
Twins are regularly reported to invent languages of their own, unintelligible to others. These languages are known as autonomous languages, cryptophasia or idioglossia. Despite current belief, this is not a rare phenomenon. Autonomous languages exist in about 40% of all twins, but often disappear soon.
That's because twins are born prematurely 60 percent of the time and land in the costly neonatal intensive care unit more often than singletons. The article also mentions that these babies are more susceptible to mental retardation and learning disabilities.
Do twins develop language more slowly? According to research, speech delay in twins is more likely to happen than to their peers. However, they do tend to catch up by age four.
To minimize confusion, take a close look at both babies, because even identicals can have unique features, such as birthmarks or moles. Some parents will paint a toenail for each twin, either using different colors or painting just one. You can also try putting an anklet or different bracelets on one or both babies.
June Gibbons (born 11 April 1963) and Jennifer Gibbons (11 April 1963 – 9 March 1993) were identical twins who grew up in Wales. They became known as "The Silent Twins", since they only communicated with each other.
The root of TES is competition. As with any other children, twins will crave attention and approval as individuals. If they don't get it, they will often demand it by misbehaving or acting out.
When Your Twins Should Start Talking. By 18 months, your twins should be able to say around twenty words. These will be simple words like mama and dadda. Your children will use various sounds and rhythms to “talk” as they play and interact with others.
Cryptophasia is thought to occur among almost 50% of twins (both identical and fraternal). Under heavier scrutiny, most cryptophasia is revealed to be toddlers' mispronunciation of their mother tongue – a phase that every child goes through.
Not necessarily. While speech delays, language delays, and learning differences are often a hallmark of ASD, a speech delay by itself does not mean a child has autism. In fact, there are key differences between communication delays caused by autism and other types of speech-language disorders.
For IQ scores, twins scored 0.09 points lower than non-twins at age 8 and 0.83 points lower at 10. However, twins scored higher at age 12 by 0.14 points. The only significant difference found was at age 10.
Analyses of data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health show that MZ twins were significantly more physically attractive and healthier than dizygotic (DZ) twins and singletons.
The results suggest that twin fetuses are aware of their counterparts in the womb, that they prefer to interact with them, and that they respond to them in special ways. Contact between them appeared to be planned—not an accidental outcome of spatial proximity, says study co-author Cristina Becchio of Turin.
Identical twins may say that they are not attracted to the same people. However, researcher Nancy Segal surmises that twins actually feel the same attractions, but as soon as one twin makes her interest known, the second twin will not pursue the other's object of interest.
Brain-imaging research has shown that during mental tasks, such as memorising numbers, the patterns of brain activity (which can be considered a physical correlate of thought) are more similar among identical twins than non-identical twins.