Subjects: Psychology >> Social Psychology submitted time 2023-03-28 Cooperative journals: 《心理科学进展》
Abstract： Daily human touch varies in its forms, frequencies, and experiences. While some types of touch are pleasurable, others can be undesirable. The pleasure of affective touch relies on C-tactile afferents, a class of low-threshold mechanosensitive neurons that innervate the hairy skin. The affective aspect of touch is encoded by C-tactile afferents, and an interpersonal gentle touch is within the sensitive stimulus range of C-tactile, which is commonly applied to express or believed to transmit positive emotions such as love, care, and appreciation. Affective touch refers to these types of touching behaviors, and has positive impacts on individual mental health. Affective touch has the physiological capacity to monitor psychological stress by regulating the level of endogenous hormones such as oxytocin, β-endorphin, dopamine, and serotonin. Affective touch can also be seen psychologically as an adaptive social function that fosters relationships, brings about positive feelings, and enhances subjective well-being.Human has the inherent ability to experience the pleasure of touch, but the acquired environment also plays a critical role. Touch is a type of sensory experience that is closely tied to psychology and culture, and our perceptions of touch are influenced by our subjective cognitive processes. Early experiences of touch and sociocultural factors work together to shape an individual's internal pattern of touch processing. Individuals may interpret touch behaviors in a more prosocial way when they have a positive internal pattern of touch processing, and they can actively engage in affective touch to foster closeness and strengthen social bonds. On the contrary, individuals' subjective aversion and avoidance of touch behaviors are related to negative internal pattern of touch processing, which is shaped by adverse early experiences such as tactile deprivation and childhood abuse. A lack of pleasant touch experiences is related to insecure attachment and various mental disorders especially personality disorders and autism spectrum disorders. Individuals with inadequate functioning of affective touch or a negative internal pattern of touch processing may likely feel disgusted by and thus avoid touch activities, which can compromise the social benefits that come with touch, lead to chronic social withdrawal, and result in aberrant social development. Touch can aid the treatment of people with mental disorders in addition to safeguarding the mental health of the general population. It is likely that people's lifestyles lack affective touch, and the value of affective touch as an embodied social relationship may be underestimated in daily life. However, affective touch is barred from playing an appropriate significant role in treatment because of the ethical concerns with touching behaviors. Distinct from traditional types of touch, mediated touch and virtual touch elicit touch-like sensations through either other sensory information or other devices as the medium. They can be applied as a transitional or alternative intervention to help people avoidant to real touch correct their negative internal pattern of touch processing so that they can gradually adapt to and accept affective touch, and eventually use affective touch as an effective way to improve their interpersonal functioning and mental health.
Subjects: Psychology >> Clinical and Counseling Psychology submitted time 2022-06-24
Abstract：
Affective touch refers to touch behaviors that are used to express or believed to transmit feelings of love, care, appreciation, and so on. C-tactile (CT) afferents, a type of low-threshold mechanosensitive neurons that innervate the hairy skin, are responsible for the pleasure of affective touch. An individual’s internal pattern of touch processing is shaped by a combination of early touch experiences and sociocultural variables. A positive internal pattern of touch processing can strengthen social bonding and promote closeness, while touch avoidance is commonly related to psychological disorders. Although affective touch has therapeutic benefits, its application to psychotherapy practices involves ethical issues. Mediated touch and virtual touch can be novel approaches to treat touch avoidance and address ethical issues.
Peer Review Status:
Awaiting Review
Subjects: Psychology >> Social Psychology submitted time 2019-01-02
Abstract： Previous social neuroscience studies focused mainly on the neural networks that sustain an understanding of a single individual’s neutral or negative intentions. However, few studies have explored those of different types of social interactive intentions performed by two or a number of individuals and their whole body movements. In addition, the spatio-temporal dynamics of understanding the kind and hostile intentions in the human brain also remain unclear. In order to address the above issue, the electroencephalograph (EEG) technique was employed to explore the dissociative neural correlates of understanding kind versus hostile intention. Twenty healthy participants were recruited for the experiment. Their behavioral data (accuracy and reaction time) and electrical brain activities were recorded while they were watching colorful photos depicting two actors’ actions and performing an intention inference task (IIT). There were three different types of action intentions: kindness, hostility and non-interactiveness (neutrality). The ERP data was analyzed using the Scan and sLoreta software in an off-line way. The Univariate Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) with repeated measures of mean accuracy showed no significant difference among three conditions, while a main effect of condition existed for reaction time. The reaction times of hostile intention were shorter than those of the kind and neutral intentions, while no significant difference was found between the latter two conditions. The ERP data were analyzed using a three-way repeated measure ANOVA. The ANOVA factors were intention condition (kindness, hostility and neutrality), laterality (left, midline and right areas) and caudality (frontal, central and parietal areas). Electrophysiological results showed, over the frontal area, a significantly more negative amplitude of N250 (170~270 ms) for neutral intention compared to kind and hostile intentions, and the N250 amplitudes for kind intention were also more negative than those for hostile intention, especially on the FZ electrode site. The source localization showed maximum activation in Broadman 10(BA10), in the vicinity of middle frontal gyrus, for N250 for kind and hostile intentions. At the later stage (270~450 ms), the peak amplitudes of the P300 for hostile intention were more positive than those for the kind and neutral intentions, and the P300 amplitudes for kind intention were also more positive than those for neutral intention over the central, parietal areas as well as the right hemisphere. The maximum activation for P300 of kind and hostile intentions was found in BA45, located in the vicinity of insula, and a stronger activity existed for hostile intention compared to kind intention. These findings show that there is a spatio-temporal dynamic dissociation between kind and hostile intentions understanding in the brain. Altogether, the current study provides electrophysiological evidence underlying the kind, hostile interactive intentions and non-interactive (neutral) intention understanding, and suggests a prioritized and sustained processing for hostile interactive intention. The study enriches the contents of the two-stage intention-understanding model and the putative Hierarchical & Multi-level Cognitive Framework (HMCF) in Theory of Mind." "
Subjects: Psychology >> Cognitive Psychology Subjects: Psychology >> Social Psychology submitted time 2018-12-26
Abstract： "
Peer Review Status:Awaiting Review
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