Babies kicking in the womb are creating a map of their bodies


The kicks a mother feels from her unborn child may allow the baby to ‘map’ their own body and enable them to eventually explore their surroundings, suggests new research. For the study, researchers measured brainwaves produced when newborns kick their limbs during rapid eye movement sleep, finding that fast brainwaves – a brainwave pattern typically seen in neonates – fire in the corresponding hemisphere.