Use Nurturing Touch

Touch in the context of parenting appears to be a sparsely researched topic, which is interesting considering how critical nurturing touch is for a child’s growth and development.

Nearly every study noted the lack of research, and two studies are simply observational in nature to identify normative parenting touch and trends over time. Viewing some of these studies together and even in relationship to research related to other Principles provides links to potentially interesting relationships. Mother-infant skin-to-skin contact (SSC) in the first week postpartum reduces mothers' self-reported depressive symptoms and physiological stress. In another study, we see that oxytocin increases in highly affectionate contact and breastfeeding, and though not presented here, breastfeeding is also related to attachment quality, oxytocin, and touch.

Many other questions arise as we consider the exciting possibilities for touch, and we hope that more research might restore and re-establish the importance of this simple yet overlooked aspect of parenting.

A Longitudinal Investigation of Maternal Touching Across the First 6 Months of Life: Age and Context Effects

Jean, A. D., Stack, D. M., & Fogel, A. (2009). A longitudinal investigation of maternal touching across the first 6 months of life: Age and context effects. Infant Behavior and Development, 32(3), 344-349.

As infants grew older, mothers provided less nurturing touch, patting and stroking but more tickling and static touch.

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Sample

  • N: 12 mothers and their full-term infants (eight male, four female)
  • Subject Ages: Birth to 2 years
  • Location: United States, a midwestern community
  • SES: Middle class
  • Eligibility: Not available
  • Additional:
    • All mothers were over 21 years, had completed high school diplomas and beyond, and were from intact, middle-class families
    • 11 Caucasian, one African American

Objective

  1. To observe the overall duration of maternal touch and the types of touch employed by mothers across age (1, 3 and 5 1/2 months) and interaction context.

Variables Measured, Instruments Used

  • Maternal touch - the Caregiver Infant Touch Scale

Design—Descriptive longitudinal

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Findings

  1. Mothers provided diverse tactile stimulation to their infants, varying from passive touch to active and stimulating behaviors.
  2. The amount and type of touch that mothers provided changed with the infant’s age and the interaction context.
  3. Infant’s age influenced duration and types of touch mothers utilized.
  4. Across age, a decrease in nurturing touch, patting and stroking was observed.
  5. As the infants aged, there was an increase in tickling and static touch.

Limitations

  • Small sample size
  • Mother-infant interaction was only seen in two contexts and for five-minute periods.

 

 

 

 

 

Effect of Mother/Infant Skin-to-Skin Contact on Postpartum Depressive Symptoms and Maternal Physiological Stress

Bigelow, A., Power, M., MacLellan-Peters, J., Alex, M., & McDonald, C. (2012). Effect of Mother/Infant Skin-to-Skin Contact on Postpartum Depressive Symptoms and Maternal Physiological Stress. Journal of Obstetric, Gynecologic, & Neonatal Nursing, 41(3), 369-382

Skin-to-skin contact lessened the mother’s stress and postpartum depression symptoms within the first month after childbirth.

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Sample

  • N: 90
  • Subject Ages: Mean maternal age was 29.4 years
  • Location: Canada, perinatal clinics at two hospitals in a rural eastern area 
  • SES: Not available
  • Eligibility: Mothers of full-term infants who had no medical problems, and the mothers who had no immediate postpartum complications
  • Additional:
    • 42% with university degree, 39% had some university or postsecondary education, 16% had a high school diploma with no further education, 3% were without a high school diploma
    • 99% white/non-Hispanic
    • 49% first child, 29% had a previous child, 22% had two or more previous children
    • 77% of the mothers chose to initially breastfeed their infant

Hypotheses

  1. Mothers who engaged in skin-to-skin contact with their infants would have fewer depressive symptoms and have lower salivary cortisol than mothers who did not engage in skin-to-skin contact.

Variables Measured, Instruments Used

  • Depression -
    • the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale
    • the Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression Scale
  • Salivary cortisol - samples taken at infant age of 1 week and 1 month

Design—Longitudinal

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Findings

  1. Mother/infant skin-to-skin contact lessened the mother’s self-reported depressive symptoms and physiological stress in the first postpartum weeks.
  2. At the one-week visit, the mothers in the skin-to-skin contact group scored significantly lower on the depression scales than the control group. This trend continued at the one-month visit, but the difference was smaller.
  3. By the two- and three-month visits, there were no differences in the two groups' scores on the depression scales.
  4. Mothers in the skin-to-skin contact and control groups did not differ from one another in their salivary cortisol level at either of the test intervals.
  5. Individually, the mothers in the skin-to-skin contact group saw a significant reduction in their own salivary cortisol levels between the one-week and one-month tests, indicating that skin-to-skin contact significantly reduced physiological stress in the mothers.

Limitations

  • Mothers were not randomized into control or skin-to-skin groups. Mothers were assigned to groups based on the hospital they delivered in.
  • Study participants were self-selected, choosing whether or not to participate in the study at the time of their children’s births.
  • There were more mothers in the control group than the skin-to-skin group, and there was a greater number of mothers in the skin-to-skin group that did not meet the criteria for inclusion in the skin-to-skin group.
  • Mothers in the study were from a homogeneous rural community. This limits the ability to generalize these results to more diverse or high-risk populations.
  • There was a difference in maternal age between the control group and the skin-to-skin contact group.
  • Skin-to-skin contact was based on mother’s report.
  • No test of bidirectional influences in the dyad

Natural Variations in Maternal and Paternal Care are Associated with Systematic Changes in Oxytocin Following Parent-Infant Contact

Feldman, R., Gordon, I., Schneiderman, I., Weisman, O., & Zagoory-Sharon, O. (2010). Natural variations in maternal and paternal care are associated with systematic changes in oxytocin following parent-infant contact. Psychoneuroendocrinology, 35(8), 1133-1141.

Oxytocin levels rise in both mothers and fathers who provide high levels of affectionate touch but not in parents who provide less nurturing touch.

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Sample

  • N: 112 parents: 71 mothers, 41 fathers (not couples)
  • Subject Ages: Parents of infants ages 4 to 6 months
  • Location: Canada
  • SES: Middle class
  • Eligibility: Healthy parents and children
  • Additional:
    • All parents completed at least 12 years of education
    • Mothers average age 28.7 years, completed 15.7 years of education
    • 81.3% were breastfeeding
    • Fathers average age 29.1 years, completed 15.5 years of education
    • Infants were born full-term, 96.3% were vaginal deliveries, average Apgar scores of 9.4

Hypotheses

  1. There will be no difference in the baseline levels of plasma and salivary oxytocin (OT) in mothers and fathers during the first months of parenting.
  2. Mothers who provide high levels of affectionate contact, but not those showing low levels, will show an increase in OT levels following mother-infant contact.
  3. Fathers who provide high levels of affectionate contact, but not those showing low levels, will show an increase in OT level following father-infant contact.

Variables Measured, Instruments Used

  • Oxytocin - ELISA kit
  • Parent affectionate contact - the Coding of Parent Infant Interactions (Noldus, Netherlands)
  • Parent stimulatory contact - the Coding of Parent Infant Interactions (Noldus, Netherlands)

Design—Correlational

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Findings

  1. Mothers and fathers show similar baseline levels of plasma and salivary oxytocin (OT).
  2. Plasma and salivary OT are inter-related.
  3. OT is individually stable across observations.
  4. Maternal and paternal OT is differentially related to affectionate and stimulatory contact.
  5. OT increases in high-affectionate contact mothers following mother-infant contact but not in low-affectionate contact mothers.
  6. OT increases in high-stimulatory contact fathers following parent-infant contact but not in low-stimulatory contact fathers.

Limitations

  • The results do not imply causal relations, and the links may be accounted for by other variables.
  • The medium-size correlation between plasma and salivary OT may point to a shared mechanism underlying the functioning of these two peripheral systems.
  • Several studies have not found an OT increase following touch; thus, the conditions under which touch does or does not increase OT need further study.

 

 

The Development of Maternal Touch Across the First Year of Life

Ferber, S. G., Feldman, R., & Makhoul, I. R. (2008). The development of maternal touch across the first year of life. Early Human Development, 84(6), 363-370.

While maternal touch predicts mother-infant reciprocity, which is linked to positive child cognitive, language, and social-emotional development, the incidence of all forms of nurturing touch decrease through the infant’s first year, especially after six months.

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Sample

  • N: 131
  • Subject Ages: 3, 6, 9 and 12 months
  • Location: Israel, northern region
  • SES: Middle class
  • Eligibility: Healthy mother and infant
  • Additional: Urban

Hypothesis

  1. Affectionate touch would be the most growth-promoting form of touch and would have the closest relations to mother-infant reciprocity as compared to all other forms of touch. Reciprocity was selected as an outcome variable due to the reported links between mother-infant reciprocity with the child’s cognitive, linguistic and social-emotional outcomes.

Variables Measured, Instruments Used

  • Maternal touch - the Touch Scoring Instrument
  • Maternal sensitivity and dyadic reciprocity - the Coding Interactive Behavior System

Design—Cross-sectional

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Findings

  1. All forms of touch—affectionate, stimulating and instrumental touch—decreased across the first year of life.
  2. There was a significant decrease in affectionate and stimulating touch between six and nine months.
  3. Results showed that maternal affectionate touch was a significant predictor of dyadic reciprocity; affectionate touch explained unique variance in dyadic reciprocity above and beyond the effects of infant age, gender, birth order or ethnicity.

Limitations

  • This was a cross-sectional study rather than longitudinal; therefore the stability of touch behavior in individual dyads was not studied or accounted for.
  • Convenience sample
  • The study is based on observing only one interaction among the dyads and therefore may not be truly representative of dyad reciprocity.
  • Procedural differences in carrying out the study for the different age groups may pose some limitations on general conclusions.

Touch for Socioemotional and Physical Well-Being: A Review

Field, T. (2010). Touch for socioemotional and physical well-being: A review. Developmental Review, 30(4), 367-383.

Touch is needed for social-emotional and physical development and well-being. In addition, there are therapeutic benefits of massage.

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Sample

  • N: Not available
  • Search Method: Not available
  • Inclusion Criteria: Studies published between 2001 and date of publication

Objectives

  1. To review:
  • The role of touch in early development, including the effects of touch deprivation and touch aversion and the effects of touch on communication, emotions and personal relationships;
  • The physiological and biochemical effects of touch;
  • Massage therapy effects on various conditions including, prematurity, pain, attentiveness, depression and immune function;
  • Virtual reality touch.

Design—Descriptive literature review

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Findings

  1. Current research highlights the need for touch for socioemotional and physical development and well-being and the therapeutic benefits of massage.

 

 

 

Use Nurturing Touch Additional References

Anderson, J. G., & Taylor, A. G. (2011). Effects of Healing Touch in Clinical Practice A Systematic Review of Randomized Clinical Trials. Journal of Holistic Nursing, 29(3), 221-228.
Bautista, D. M., & Lumpkin, E. A. (2011). Probing mammalian touch transduction. The Journal of General Physiology, 138(3), 291-301.
Beckes, L., & Coan, J. A. (2011). Social baseline theory: the role of social proximity in emotion and economy of action. Social and Personality Psychology Compass, 5(12), 976-988.
Bell, C. (2011). The Healing Properties of Touch Associated with Premature Infants and Childhood Development: A Literature Review.
DallaLibera, F., Basoeki, F., Minato, T., Ishiguro, H., & Menegatti, E. (2011, September). Teaching by touching: Interpretation of tactile instructions for motion development. In Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS), 2011 IEEE/RSJ International Conference (pp. 3480-3487). IEEE.
DEd, C. J., & Ikuta, L. (2010). Procedural Pain Management for Neonates Using Nonpharmacological Strategies: Part 2--Mother-Driven Interventions. Trauma.
Eidelman, A. I., Hovars, R., & Kaitz, M. (1994). Comparative tactile behavior of mothers and fathers with their newborn infants. Israel Journal of Medical Sciences, 30(1), 79.
Gordon, I., Voos, A. C., Bennett, R. H., Bolling, D. Z., Pelphrey, K. A., & Kaiser, M. D. (2011). Brain mechanisms for processing affective touch. Human Brain Mapping.
Jung, M. J., & Fouts, H. N. (2011). Multiple caregivers’ touch interactions with young children among the Bofi foragers in Central Africa. International Journal of Psychology, 46(1), 24-32.
Katsurada, E. (2012). The Relationship between Parental Physical Affection and Child Physical Aggression among Japanese Preschoolers. Child Studies in Diverse Contexts, 2(1), 1-10.
Leonard, J. (2011). The Effect of Friendly Touch on Compliance in Preschool-Age Children (Doctoral dissertation, Wesleyan University).
O'Brien, M., & Lynch, H. (2011). Exploring the role of touch in the first year of life: mothers' perspectives of tactile interactions with their infants. The British Journal of Occupational Therapy, 74(3), 129-136.
Oveis, C., Gruber, J., Keltner, D., Stamper, J. L., & Boyce, W. T. (2009). Smile intensity and warm touch as thin slices of child and family affective style. Emotion, 9(4), 544.
Shai, D., & Belsky, J. (2011). When words just won’t do: Introducing parental embodied mentalizing. Child Development Perspectives, 5(3), 173-180.