Infants and The Benefits of Touch
Studies have shown that infants who have been the recipients of positive touch experience more benefits as they develop emotionally and socially. Experiments have done with infants up to four months of age using both positive touch (stroking or cuddling) and negative touch (poking, pinching or tickling). The infants who received the positive touch cried less often and also vocalized and smiled more than the infants who were touched negatively. Infants who were the recipients of negative touching have been linked with emotional and behavioural problems later in life. A lower amount of physical violence in adults has been discovered in cultures with greater levels of positive physical touching.
Human infants have a primal need to be carried close to their mother's body. They need constant physical contact for their first few weeks or months of life. They are born with reflexes that aid them in holding onto their mother's body in every way possible, these being the Moro reflex, and the instinctive grasping of a finger or object placed in their palm. Their legs usually resume an M shape, their knees being the top peaks of the M, which is the ideal position both for optimal hip development, and makes it comfortable for an adult to carry them laid on their chest. They also need frequent care, given that they need to eat and eliminate more often than other mammalian offspring, that are cared for in nests, thus could endanger themselves by hungry crying and the smell of their excrement.
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