By Rachael Thompson
Disclaimer:
The material in this blog is not to be used by any commercial or personal entity without expressed written consent of the blog author. The statements in this blog are not intended to provide individual strategies or interventions. The author does not in any way guarantee or warrant the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of any message and will not be held responsible for the content of any message. Always consult your personal Occupational Therapist for specific sensory processing advice.
In the majority of humans when we receive affective touch/ social touch it stimulates the parts of the brain that are associated with emotion, empathy, compassion, interpersonal experience, self-awareness and emotional regulation in addition it stimulates the part of the brain that is associated with making decisions based on our enjoyment or reward from the experience. Research suggests that affective touch responses are encoded in the brain soon after birth (Jonsson et al, 2018)
Most people therefore have an innate understanding of the social and emotional significance of touch. It therefore follows that if this innate understanding is perhaps different or compromised for individuals it is really going to have an impact across their lifespan.
Research has found that common amongst autistic individuals is that the social and emotional regions of the brain are not stimulated as much by affective/ social touch compared to more typically developing individuals (Kaiser et al, 2016).Therefore it is hypothesised that the experience of the social and emotional significance of some forms of touch is different amongst the autistic population.
This research would make sense of my experience and I can relate to the evidence that would suggest that the reward and pleasure part of my brain did not activate when experiencing affective touch like it does for most people. Because I wasn’t getting the reward that other people get there was not as much incentive for me to seek and initiate contact with others and my response to others touching me was atypical and probably didn’t give the signals to others that touch would be welcomed and received well.
I think there is also much more than simply not perceiving and processing the social and emotional significance and the sense of pleasure/ reward that comes from affective/ social touch. I think that affective touch in particular light touch such as a gentle touch on the arm or shoulder that is often used as a communicative gesture stimulated a very different autonomic nervous system response in me.
Research has shown that affective touch for the majority of people stimulates a parasympathetic regulatory response which reduces stress responses and promotes social engagement, connection with others and the emotion of love. But this is not how my nervous system responds especially to light or gentle touch. I believe that for many individual's with autism it is also not how their nervous system responds.
Research into autism, sensory modulation and tactile defensiveness would suggest that for many autistic individuals their response to touch creates a different autonomic nervous system response and that affective touch especially light touch such as the type of touch that people give by way of consolation or when someone is feeling sad…..along with other tactile stimulation involving light touch such as tags in clothes, the feel of fabric on skin etc. can create a sympathetic nervous system response, one of fight of flight or the dorsal vagal response of freeze. Again this response is something I can identify with and in many instances of light touch my reaction would be to pull away (a flight response, that is if I am not quick enough to avoid it in the first place).
I experience light touch as like a mild electric shock, if I haven’t seen it coming and it is a surprise I feel it as like a big electric shock. When people go to hug me it is not the deep pressure of the hug that I find stressful….I like that bit.........it is the bit immediately before or after when a person might move their hand across your shoulders or touch you lightly on the waist when disengaging from a hug. Hugs that people do by way of greeting the light social type make my body tense up and I find it incredibly unpleasant.
This aversion and response to affective touch I would suggest impacts greatly on attachment and connectedness or bonding particularly with primary caregivers. The actions that a caregiver takes to nurture and look after a child (such as bathing, dressing, and grooming) that would support connection and bonding can for may individuals with tactile sensitivity be highly alerting to our nervous system and result in a sympathetic nervous system response (fight or flight and resultant anticipatory anxiety in regards to physical contact with others).
In addition the actions that caregivers typically take to try and comfort a child that is upset such as gently stroking, gentle hugs, and using close proximity could be alerting for a child with tactile defensiveness resulting in the child trying to pull away from the contact and reducing the capacity to engage in co-regulation with their caregiver. Without understanding that it was the tactile sensation that the child is pulling away from this can lead to a sense of rejection for the parent and the parent may also find it difficult to regulate themselves in the presence of the child as they struggle to calm or comfort them.
It is really important to understand individual sensory processing differences so that we can provide the right sensory input to support regulation of a child's nervous system. Understanding the type of sensory input that an individual finds regulating and is appropriate to their individual needs and giving them the opportunity to access this will have the potential to support and foster co-regulation and a sense of safety.
References
Boehme, R., Hauser, S., Gerling, G.J., Heilig, M. and Olausson, H. (2019). Distinction of self-produced touch and social touch at cortical and spinal cord levels. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, [online] 116(6), pp.2290–2299. Available at: https://www.painresearchforum.org/news/112660-how-brain-distinguishes-different-types-touch [Accessed 11 Oct. 2021].
Cascio, C.J., Moore, D. and McGlone, F. (2019). Social touch and human development. Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, 35, pp.5–11
iasat.org. (n.d.). What Is Affective Touch? – IASAT. [online] Available at: https://iasat.org/about/affective-touch/.
Jönsson, E.H., Kotilahti, K., Heiskala, J., Wasling, H.B., Olausson, H., Croy, I., Mustaniemi, H., Hiltunen, P., Tuulari, J.J., Scheinin, N.M., Karlsson, L., Karlsson, H. and Nissilä, I. (2018). Affective and non-affective touch evoke differential brain responses in 2-month-old infants. NeuroImage, 169, pp.162–171.
Jon Lieff, MD. (2014). Social Touch Brain Pathways. [online] Available at: https://jonlieffmd.com/blog/social-touch-brain-pathways.
Kaiser, M.D., Yang, D.Y.-J. ., Voos, A.C., Bennett, R.H., Gordon, I., Pretzsch, C., Beam, D., Keifer, C., Eilbott, J., McGlone, F. and Pelphrey, K.A. (2015). Brain Mechanisms for Processing Affective (and Nonaffective) Touch Are Atypical in Autism. Cerebral Cortex, [online] 26(6), pp.2705–2714. Available at: https://academic.oup.com/cercor/article/26/6/2705/1754257?login=true [Accessed 27 Nov. 2021].
McGlone, F., Wessberg, J. and Olausson, H. (2014). Discriminative and Affective Touch: Sensing and Feeling. Neuron, 82(4), pp.737–755.
Mikkelsen, M., Wodka, E.L., Mostofsky, S.H. and Puts, N.A.J. (2018). Autism spectrum disorder in the scope of tactile processing. Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, 29, pp.140–150.
Schaffler, M.D., Middleton, L.J. and Abdus-Saboor, I. (2019). Mechanisms of Tactile Sensory Phenotypes in Autism: Current Understanding and Future Directions for Research. Current Psychiatry Reports, 21(12).
Tavassoli, T., Bellesheim, K., Tommerdahl, M., Holden, J.M., Kolevzon, A. and Buxbaum, J.D. (2015). Altered tactile processing in children with autism spectrum disorder. Autism Research, 9(6), pp.616–620.Voos, A.C., Pelphrey, K.A. and Kaiser, M.D. (2012). Autistic traits are associated with diminished neural response to affective touch. Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, 8(4), pp.378–386.
Voos, A.C., Pelphrey, K.A. and Kaiser, M.D. (2012). Autistic traits are associated with diminished neural response to affective touch. Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, 8(4), pp.378–386.
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