What touching you makes me feel - hedonic and autonomic responses in promoting an affective touch

Abstract

Interpersonal touch is intrinsically reciprocal since it entails a person promoting and another receiving the touch. While several studies have investigated the beneficial effects of receiving an affective touch, the affective experience of caressing another individual remains largely unknown. Here, we investigated the hedonic and autonomic responses (skin conductance and heart rate) of people when they promote an affective touch. We also examined whether interpersonal relationship, gender, and eye contact modulate these responses. As expected, caressing the partner was perceived more pleasant then caressing a stranger, especially if the affective touch occurred together with mutual eye contact. Promoting an affective touch to the partner also resulted in a decrease of both autonomic responses and anxiety levels, suggesting the occurrence of a calming effect. Additionally, these effects were more pronounced in females compared to males, indicating that hedonic and autonomic aspects of affective touch are modulated by social relationships as well as by gender. These findings show for the first time that caressing a beloved one is not only pleasant, but also reduces autonomic responses and anxiety in the person promoting the touch. This might suggest that affective touch has an instrumental role for romantic partners in promoting and reinforcing their affective bonding.