Learn Four Kinds of a Child's Cry, Thanks to a $2.99 Taiwanese App

A certain application that can differentiate between varieties of crying sounds made by babies has been developed by Taiwanese researchers.

The Infant Cries Translator app was created at the National Taiwan University Hospital Yunlin. It can distinguish four different crying sounds. The cry sounds are recorded and then compared against against a huge database, The Monitor Daily reported.

The Infant Cries Translator was developed through researching about 200,000 crying sounds collected from 100 newborn babies over two years. Researchers also uploaded these sounds into an online catalog. Dr Chen Si-da and Chang Chuan-yu had led the analysis of frequency of each scream and they were assisted by a team of researchers. They were able to differentiate slight distinctions in acoustics of the sounds, NBC News reported.

The app demonstrates the analysis of an infant's cries using a smartphone, the data transmits in approximately 15 seconds. Furthermore, the app has been found to have 92 percent accuracy for babies aging two weeks and younger. This helps notify parents whenever their baby is sleepy, hungry, has wet his diaper, or is in pain. The study is said to become less accurate as the baby gets older.

Chuan-yu has explained, "So far, according to the feedback from users, the accuracy of the app we've tested can reach 92 percent for babies under two weeks old. As for the babies under one or two months, the accuracy of the app can also reach up to 84 or 85 percent. Even for the four month old baby, the accuracy can reach 77 percent."

After downloading The Infant Cries Translator, users will have to set the nationality and date of birth of the newborn baby, according to Chuan-yu. When the infant cries, the users will need to push the recording button and hold it for about 10 seconds. The sound will be saved to the Cloud Storage. The result is then transmitted back to the phone.

The app is currently downloadable on Android and IOS via the Google Play and App Store. It was made available early last year and only costs $2.99 USD.