Hearing two languages in the womb may lead to bilingual newborns, Canadian and French researchers have suggested.

"Infants born to English monolingual mothers were more interested in English than Tagalog -- a language spoken in the Philippines," said Krista Byers-Heinlein and Janet F. Werker of the University of British Columbia in Vancouver and Tracey Burns of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development in France.

However, infants born to bilingual mothers regularly speaking both English and Tagalog while pregnant had an equal preference for both languages.

Also, both the monolingual infants as well as the bilingual infants were able to discriminate between the two languages, the study which was published in Psychological Science, concluded.

A method known as "high-amplitude sucking-preference procedure," which uses the infant's sucking reflex was employed by the researchers. Increased sucking indicated increased interest in a stimulus.

The authors said in a statement "The results of these studies demonstrate that the roots of bilingualism run deeper than previously imagined, extending even to the prenatal period." (With Input from Agencies)