Alzheimer's patients don't react well to baby talk -- then again, who does?

A recent report says Alzheimer's patients react badly to "elder speak" -- a form of baby talk consisting of a high-pitched sing-song voice and misused pronouns like "Are we ready for our bath?" According to the study, the approach, which is intended to be caring and easy to understand, has the opposite effect -- causing patients to be uncooperative and, well, pissed off. Alzheimer patients, despite their affliction, are adults and should be spoken to with respect. We'd be pissed off, too.

Baby talk is pretty irritating no matter who you're talking to -- so why do parents consistently use it to talk that way to their children? Research keeps telling us children understand what's being said to them earlier than ever imagined. If parents are reading and playing Mozart to babies in utero, why then ask if "baby make all gone with her num nums" when they're born? Dr. Gwenn, pediatrician and friend of momlogic, agrees. "Parents should talk to kids in an age-appropriate way that's not beneath them." In her pediatric practice, she's heard many a parent use baby talk during an examination: "Some parents come up with insane euphemisms for private parts. Sometimes it's actually okay to call a vagina a 'vagina.'"

So when is it time to nix the baby talk? "When babies are newborn I suppose it's OK, but after a couple of months -- once the babies are starting to mimic our language -- it's time to kill the baby talk," Dr. Gwenn adds. "For some parents, it's hard to give it up."

Listening to others talk to our kids might be just as difficult as hearing a caregiver talk baby talk to our own mother in any stage of Alzheimer's. One mom finds it extremely hard to tolerate: "When someone starts talking to my daughter in baby talk, I say, 'You can use real words, she speaks English.'"

Tell us the truth: When did you stop using baby speak?