Random fun link: Learning from children: strategy, tactics and games in times of rapid change [http://news.noahraford.com/?p=203]
Of course, anyone holding that theory would need to give an approximate age at which they are able to observe the sound and mimic it. The point here is that the age at which this happens is much earlier then people thought before.
This, I think, is what makes it a surprising discovery.
Where did the journalist get this bit of fiction from?
One simple web search reveals this:
"Children first begin lying verbally around age 3, the time when language development and the ability to control one's own mental skills combine to form a child's theory of mind. Also at this age, children have learned their parents' rules and the consequences of breaking them. So what does a child do when Mom finds a hand in the cookie jar? Lie."
Still it's good to spread the word to those who don't that children are way more complicated than we've thought. They are, essentially, tiny humans with all the behaviors and fewer of the social graces and emotional control.
