I’m going to refer to a study which starts off with the words, “Receiving touch is of critical importance”. The words at the end of the study are as follows: “In conclusion, we show clear evidence that such interventions are beneficial across a large number of both physical and mental health outcomes”. This applies to people who are healthy and those who are unhealthy and people of all ages. It also applies to cats and dogs! 😉💕
Touching the head is more beneficial than touching the arm.
Touching can take many forms such as a hug. Even touching an object confers health benefits on the person.
And they add that a touch from animals is also very helpful in improving mental and physical health by reducing anxiety, feelings of depression and it can reduce pain.
The study states that “It is widely known that many animal species benefit from touch interactions and that engaging in touch promotes their well-being as well”.
I’ve mentioned several times on this website that cats like to touch other animals in the family home with whom they are friendly. And they like to touch their human caregivers. This is instinctive and they do it because it improves their well-being. That must be the obvious conclusion.
RELATED: Talk and touch, two reasons why cats tend to prefer women
The point, however, is that it works two ways. If a person touches another person the recipient feels better according to this study. But the person who is doing the touching also feels better. That must be the conclusion.
The same goes for the human-to-cat relationship. Cats like to be touched particularly around the head and humans like to touch their cats around the head. This would appear, according to the findings of the study, to be the best for of touching in terms of maximum benefit.
The study states that across a number of animal species, there was strong evidence in their study “that touch interventions… Had positive health effects in animal species as well”.
And they added that: “Overall, touch interventions were beneficial for both physical and mental health, with a medium effect size”. The last phrase is strange but I will take that to mean that the benefits are medium in effect and therefore noticeable but not huge.
They added that “Our work illustrates that touch interventions are best suited for reducing pain, depression and anxiety in adults and children as well as for increasing weight gain in newborns.”
To stress the point (I’m repeating myself because I’m looking at different sources), “touch interventions were associated with positive effects on mental health. They reduced feelings of depression (effect size: 0.59) and state/trait anxiety (effect size: 0.59).
Unhealthy people benefited more than healthy people in terms of mental health.
There was no difference between medical professionals touching unhealthy people compared to a familiar person.
The more often people engage in touch sessions the greater the benefit. Short sessions of touching did not significantly affect outcomes which I take to mean that sessions need to have a reasonable length to be effective.
RELATED: The pleasure of being touched by us is the main reason why cats like to be stroked
The point of the discussion
When I saw the headline in news media that “Touch can help improve feelings of pain or depression, study suggests”, I immediately thought of cats!
Caregivers love to touch their cats. Cats love to be touched. Cats love to touch their caregivers. Cats like to sleep next to cats with whom they are friendly, in contact with each other. And dogs and people. It all revolves around direct physical contact.
Touch is very important to general well-being for our companion cats and for us. My cat reaches out with his poor to touch my hand on my face. Cats in good relationships with their human caregiver, they like to be close to them. They like to be in contact with them. This is instinctive I would argue. It instinctive in that the cat knows it benefits them. So don’t shy away from touching your cat and accept it when they want to touch you! That’s obvious but the study adds some science to this discussion.
Postscript: I have to add one more point which is this: cats also very much like the way we smell. They have a very close connection with the body odour of their caregiver. It is very reassuring to them to smell it. Smell plays an important role in the life of a domestic cat as almost all of us know. We should allow our cats to smell us and enjoy it! It’s good for them.
