A Lancaster University study of 120 toddlers found the ability to perform complex mouth movements was strongly linked to language development.

They also found children with well developed imagination skills had better language skills.

The findings could help experts identify children who may struggle with language skills at an early stage.

At 21 months - the age of the toddlers in the study - children are learning new words at a faster rate than any other time in their lives.

The children’s language ability was assessed through a parental questionnaire, word games with simple images, and monitoring during normal play.

As well as oral motor skills, she found that hand gestures such as waving or making shapes were associated with better language development but other movements such as walking and running were not.

This team plans to follow the children at three, four and five years to see how the skills that were found to be linked to language impact on later development.