Slow stroking eased the suffering of rejected people
Social isolation usually brings to people’s suffering, and tactile contact can soften him up. With slow, careful stroking with a soft brush had a more effective psychological help are turned away than fast stroking. It established psychologists from University College London, published in the journal Scientific Reports.
There are studies that confirm the use of touch to reduce physical pain, but only if it’s a slow touch. Wanting to go further, the researchers wondered whether the same effect on emotional pain, namely the pain of social rejection.
The study involved 84 people, all women are allowed the scientists to control for gender effects.
They were split into two groups, control get a fast, neutral touch, experimental — slow affective.
To simulate ostracism in the laboratory it is customary to use the job cybermesa. In this task, the subject plays the ball with two other participants, which generates a computer. The subject is not informed about the real purpose of the study. Also he said that two other participants are volunteers, like him, and that job is to throw the ball to any of them, until the end of time. Each participant passed the control task, and the task of social exclusion.
The game was played in two rounds, each of which lasted two to three minutes. The first time the game was balanced in such a way that each of the three participants threw the ball an equal number of times. Then the subject filled out a questionnaire in which they answered questions about their perceptions related to social needs and need to be taken.
Based on the answers, displays a ratio and the lower it was, the greater was the need of the subject in acceptance — it was the main measure of social suffering.
After a short break the game continued. This time the subject threw the ball twice, and then the computer started to ignore him and play with myself. He is then blindfolded and the experimenter for 70 seconds, stroking his forearm with a soft brush at a certain speed: or three centimeters per second, or 18 inches per second. Then, the subject again completed the questionnaire.