2/2 Extraversion and attachment style were important factors in explaining how different people felt about touch in treatment. People with more positive attitudes to touch in treatment settings also showed greater wellbeing. Led by @KaterinaVafeia3 W/ @ncbowling @claudiahammond

1/2 We often experience touch in treatment settings (massage, therapeutic etc). But we know less about what contributes to different perspectives on this. We studied this with our new Touch & Health Scale:

3/3 Big thanks to all involved, esp @dueren_al for leading this project.

2/3 Affective touch before sleep had positive effects. But, too much touch was related to lower self-reported sleep quality. In short, the impact of touch is nuanced: not necessarily more is better - need to consider individual’s desire for touch. Quality over quantity!

1/3 Affective touch has been reported for its calming effects. Still, we know less about the impact on sleep. Latest publication from the Touch Test explores this: https://t.co/e1cOs8J7bE. w/ @dueren_al @ncbowling @KaterinaVafeia3 @ProfAMGregory @claudiahammond @JuanJoMadridVal

We often sleep next to another - but know little about how interpersonal touch is associated w sleep. This was examined in a paper led by @dueren_al with @mbanissy @claudiahammond @JuanJoMadridVal and Aikaterini Vafeiadou

Do you sleep better when touching your partner during sleep onset? We asked this and some more questions about sleep and touch in our new Touch Test paper. Thanks to @ncbowling @KaterinaVafeia3 @ProfAMGregory @claudiahammond @JuanJoMadridVal @mbanissy https://t.co/595cY3hRcK

Hugs are the universal medicine

And if you cannot join in person, here is an online version. As anything high quality in science, this is a team effort: @D_Tompkins020 @uzhakim @IliasTachtsidis @PaolaPinti Joy Hirsch @vigliocco_g @antoniahamilton A bit cheesy but I’m truly grateful to be part of this team 💥

Happy to see our EMA study on the association between hugging, mood and life satisfaction together with @MaikeLuhmann and @ocklenBLOG published in the Journal of Nonverbal Behavior. A short thread 🧵

New preprint on my favorite topic together with @MaikeLuhmann and @ocklenBLOG ! In this preprint, we investigated the associaton between hugging and well-being prior and during the COVID-19 pandemic. A thread 🧵 https://t.co/9EUH65WtBX

Nice review on the role of touch in loneliness. Also made me think of Kory Floyd’s paper on affectionate touch deprivation, showing connections between lack of affectionate touch, loneliness, and other health outcomes. Well worth reading both papers: https://t.co/luUcBMeCd0 + ⬇️

Oh the hugs!

Excited to share our new paper on the beneficial effects of hugging together with @GesaBerretz and @ocklenBLOG. We used the Socially Evaluated Cold Pressor Test (SECPT) to induce a stress response and investigated the stress-buffering effects of hugs in romantic partners. 1/4🧵

“ASMRtists” have been making serious money on YouTube for more than a decade. IKEA was one of the first companies to use ASMR in an advert in 2017

I'm going to write a new psychology lecture this week titled 'Critiquing CBT'. I have a few ideas but wanted to see if the people of Twitter had any suggestions for content? References welcome too! #twittereps #AcademicTwitter

Attitudes to risk and exploration in well-powered, fully-preregistered, uber-positivistic studies

There's a lot of touch research nowadays, but not much on hugs. Even though hugs are so common in everyday life! So we thought it is time to look at hugging styles :) with @chrisjedgar and @mbanissy https://t.co/GvP6Qjobfs

A whole paper on hugs? Warms my heart 🥺🥰 @dueren_al