Final answer:
Infants 2-3 months old are able to discriminate between different consonant sounds. This skill is part of their early language development, which includes the ability to distinguish a wide range of phonemes from various human languages.
Step-by-step explanation:
The question of whether infants 2-3 months old can discriminate between consonant sounds pertains to their language and auditory development. Research indicates that very young infants do indeed have the ability to differentiate between various phonemes and sounds. By the age of 2-3 months, infants have already been exposed to a range of linguistic inputs and demonstrate the ability to distinguish between different vowel and consonant sounds, which is an essential precursor to language acquisition. This discrimination ability is not limited to the languages spoken in their immediate environment; rather, infants this young can typically discern phonemes from a broad array of human languages.
As infants continue to develop, their ability to distinguish sounds becomes more refined, eventually focusing primarily on the phonemes of the languages they are exposed to regularly. By around 1 year of age, their phonemic discrimination aligns more closely with the sounds relevant to their specific linguistic environment. However, during the first few months of life, their auditory discrimination capabilities are quite broad and inclusive of a diverse range of speech sounds from different languages.