I sometimes wonder if the excessive use of cutesy babytalk langauge can negatively affect the development of children. They learn exclusively through mimicry of their parents and those around them, if a lot of what they hear is “look at my widdle babykins” then that’s how they’ll start their speech development…
I actually came into the comments to post the exact opposite, so it’s convenient to be able to disagree with your comment since disagreement is the foundation of internet discussions (is joke).
But seriously, it is a good and helpful thing: https://news.ufl.edu/2021/12/the-importance-of-baby-talk/ - random source I just googled, feel free to find your own :)
And if noting “is joke” isn’t sufficient, I’m not here to say you’re wrong, just that I had read it was a good thing previously, and came into the thread to post that :)
Fortunately linguistics has studied this a fair amount, and not only is baby talk nearly universal among cultures, it’s developmentally important for babies learning sound differentiation, plus a bunch of other benefits. https://youtu.be/-Z24GxW-mG4




