The more bizarre your baby's babble is, the better they'll be at reading, new study suggests

The more gibberish your baby utters, the better reader he or she might grow up to be, a new study shows.

Children start to experiment with making vowe l sounds about two months after birth and pick up the basic sounds of their native language by the time they are around six- months old.

But most children say their first word by one, don't start to make ( short) sentences around their second year of life, and may not read until they are anywhere between four and seven.

The latest research suggests that the children who get chattiest - even when they aren't really saying anything - might have particular literary leanings.

Scientists from Florida State University think the link they discovered could help doctors screen for reading disabilities as early as infancy.

The researchers found that those children with more complex babble as babies performed better when identifying specific letters in their later reading test.

They said children with difficulties in identifying letters are more likely to develop reading impairments, but such difficulties can't be uncovered until the child is three to five-years-old.

The researchers investigated whether assessing language ability even earlier, by measuring speech complexity in infancy, might predict later difficulties.

Study author Dr Ke l ly Farquharson, of Florida State University, said: "This paper provides exciting data to support an early and robust connection between speech production and later literacy skills.