Commentary

Adult Communications with Infants through Touch: The Forgotten Sense
Darwin W. Muir

Queen's University, Kingston, Ont., Canada

Address of Corresponding Author

Human Development 2002;45:95-99 (DOI: 10.1159/000048155)

  Key Words

• Emotion communication
• Infant-adult face-to-face interaction
• Infant social perception
• Tactile communication
• Tactile perception

  Abstract

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Despite unequivocal evidence for its importance, the study of touch as a communication channel remains one of the least researched areas in the infant interaction literature. Hertenstein's lament (this issue) about the lack of research on tactile communication is in accord with a point we made 10 years ago [see Kisilevsky, Stack, and Muir, 1991]. The continued lack is surprising given that in humans the skin is the largest sensory organ, it is the first sensory system to develop in the uterus, the fetus receives extensive prenatal stimulation, and infants learn by touch at birth. Blass, Ganchrow, and Steiner [1984] demonstrated that newborns rapidly acquire a classically conditioned anticipatory appetitive response when touch is paired with food; and, during extinction, they cry when touch no longer signals food.

  Author Contacts

Darwin Muir
Psychology Department, Queen's University
Kingston, Ontario K7L 3N6 (Canada)
Tel. +1 613 533 6011, Fax +1 613 533 2499
E-Mail muird@psyc.queensu.ca

  Article Information

Number of Print Pages : 5
Number of Figures : 0, Number of Tables : 0, Number of References : 14