The affectionate touch is an important and early relational tool between parent and child, because it helps the baby to perceive the boundaries of his body and constitutes an indispensable “food” for his physical-emotional growth
From the first moments after birth, the hands of the parents make thousands of simple gestures: they touch, support, wash, cure, console, caress … touching the child’s body is one of the first and main forms of communication and interaction with which parents come into contact with their children.
The adult-child relationship
In the first months of life, mothers touch their children between 60 and 90% of the times when they turn to them by talking or looking at them. Often this happens simply for practical purposes (the change of the diaper, move the little hands of the child to take it …); Other times to stimulate and/or recall his attention, like when the parent tries to direct his gaze on himself, touching his arm.
The parent tickles, tightens, lifts, moves the child or simply stretches or flexes his legs with the aim of making him smile. All these tactile behaviors involve some form of early relationship between the adult and the child. In fact, especially in the little ones, touch is a special communication channel that promotes a mutual exchange of sensations and perceptions. Not surprisingly, Several studies suggest how early contact has different positive effects on the development of the child: promotes physical well -being and attention to the environment, helps him to regulate his emotions, promotes the link with the adult; All aspects that support harmonious physical and emotional-relational growth.
A mutual touch
One of the peculiar aspects of the touch is that, unlike the other senses, it is by its nature bidirectional: you can see and not be seen, speak and not be listened to, but you cannot touch or be touched without avoiding direct contact with the body of the other (we speak of “intercorporentity”). As recent research has also shown, this reciprocity allows the child to feel the physical presence of the parent and at the same time to experience his body; Physical contact (in particular caresses) could therefore encourage another important aspect of development: the perception of one’s body boundaries and therefore the perception of being a separate and distinct individual from others.
From the skin to the brain
The skin is not simply an envelope that envelops us and protects from the external environment; Through it, fundamental information such as touch, pressure, proprioception (i.e. the ability to perceive and recognize, without the support of vision, the position of one’s body in space), pain, thermal sensitivity are transmitted to the brain. All these stimulations are detected through receptors in the various layers of the skin and, thanks to different types of fibers, are sent to the brain, where the characteristics of the stimulus are promptly identified to respond adequately to the environment (for example, quickly portraying the hand in response to a painful stimulus).
But what happens when, instead of a thermal, pressure or other stimulus, is a caress to solicit the skin? Recently it has been discovered that tactile stimulation of an emotional nature are sent to the brain through specific ways (the “c-tactile” fibers), or the “nervous streets of the caress”. These fibers have precise characteristics that differentiate them from all the others who transmit tactile stimuli: they are sensitive to the temperature and speed with which the hands perform the touch. In particular, they transmit the nerve impulse associated with touch when the skin temperature is the typical one (i.e. around 32 ° C) and tactile stimulation is performed at an optimal speed (from 1 to 10 cm/s); In other words, these fibers do not activate (or activate less) if a touch is performed more slowly or faster than this range of values. Furthermore, these characteristics are accompanied by a subjective perception of pleasantness from those who receive the touch.
The boundaries of one’s body
One might ask what he has to do all this with the perception of the boundaries of one’s body. In fact, our brain elaborates the perception of the body by integrating information from different sensory systems (view, hearing, input relating to the movement and position in the space etc.), but also from another fundamental source, or the information on the state of well -being of the body that come from the internal organs (the “Entertainal signals”). Much of these signals reaches a specific area of the brain known as “insula”, which is the same in which the information regarding the affectionate touch through the fibers that we mentioned a little while ago also arrives. In other words, signs coming from both from the inside and outside the body converge in this area (affectionate tactile stimulations) and this implies that this brain structure, more than others, could play a specific role in elaborating body borders. Precisely for their value of physical and emotional closeness with the adult, the caresses make this process “feed”. Moreover, this area of the brain and the specialized touch system are mature sufficiently from the early stages of life, so Through hands and affectionate physical contact, the parents actively participate immediately in the perception of body borders by the child.
Nourishment for body and mind
Touching affectionately is obviously not the only way by which the child matures a clearer perception of his “bodily self”. However, Within the parent-bambino relationship, caress and affectionate touch seem to have particular importance compared to other relational methods (for example visual contact). Thanks to the thousands of “tactile meetings” that accompany the interaction in the early years of life, parents help the child experiment with both well -being and the boundaries of their body. Perhaps for adults it is difficult to be aware of how a simple affectionate gesture can represent a fundamental “nourishment” for the body’s body and mind. A good reason to remember that, as well as food and water are essential to support the physical growth of the baby, in the same way the caresses are an indispensable food for its emotional life.
