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Home › Articles › Guiding Baby's Development › Your Baby's First Giggle

Your Baby's First Giggle

Delighting in Baby's First Laugh

By Shannon McKelden

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Nothing warms the heart more than your baby's very first real laugh. A home video of a belly-laughing baby can have a whole room of somber adults rolling on the floor in five seconds flat. But when should we expect that first laugh? What is its importance in a baby's development? And how can we make it happen more often?

A baby's laughter is magical and infectious. The first time is a joy to behold and family members just want to get it to happen again and again.

Heather Cook's now 8-month-old daughter started laughing for the first time when her 5-year-old brother performed for her. "He does everything," says Cook of Calgary, Alberta. "[He] dances, tickles, makes faces, talks gibberish ... and she loves it. We call him 'the entertainment committee' because he can always make her laugh. And best of all, he really enjoys the fact that she'll always laugh at him – making her happy makes him happy."

Is It Time to Laugh?
So when can parents look forward to that first laugh? "Babies develop at different rates," says Dr. Iman Sharif, associate professor of Clinical Pediatrics at Children's Hospital at Montefiore in the Bronx. "Some babies will give their first laugh as early as 2 months of age [and] about 90 percent of babies will give at least a little laugh by age 3 months."

But baby laughter isn't just for the joy of those around her. It is a milestone in infant development. "Laughing is an important marker of both the baby's language development and socialization," Dr. Sharif says. "It is one of the first ways that a baby communicates with people around him."

"Even more than gurgling or cooing or crying, laughter signals the emergence of a social being," says Kevin Osborn, a father of four from Park Ridge, N.J., and author of several parenting books including The Complete Idiot's Guide to Bringing up Baby

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