The Physical and Mental Health Benefits of Touch: A Plain-English Review
Touch is a fundamental part of human interaction, but how strong is the scientific evidence that touch can actually influence our physical and mental health?
This large 2024 study by Packheiser and colleagues attempted to answer that question by bringing together results from more than 200 previous studies of touch interventions involving thousands of participants.
Rather than looking at one particular form of touch, the researchers examined a wide range of interventions and health outcomes across both adults and children.
What did the research find?
Overall, the analysis found that touch interventions were associated with benefits across a range of physical and mental health outcomes.
In adults, some of the clearest benefits were found for pain, anxiety and symptoms of depression.
The researchers also found evidence of benefits for some physiological measures, although the size and consistency of the effects varied depending on what was being measured.
Interestingly, the analysis suggested that receiving touch more frequently may matter more than simply making individual sessions longer.
The researchers also examined whether touch had to come directly from another person. Some benefits were found from touch delivered by objects or devices, although interpersonal touch appeared particularly relevant for certain mental-health outcomes.
What does this mean in practice?
This study provides substantial evidence that supportive touch can influence wellbeing and that its effects are not limited to simply feeling pleasant in the moment.
Touch can interact with systems involved in pain, stress, emotion and physiological regulation.
For therapeutic work involving touch, this provides useful scientific context for understanding why carefully delivered physical contact may sometimes support regulation and wellbeing.
However, the study also reinforces something important: touch is not one single intervention.
Different forms of touch, different relationships, different settings and different individuals can produce very different experiences.
Consent, choice, predictability and how the person receiving the touch experiences it remain fundamental.
A note of caution
Although this was a very large systematic review and meta-analysis, it combined research involving many different kinds of touch, populations and health conditions.
It therefore does not demonstrate that any particular touch therapy — including NeuroAffective Touch, Shiatsu or Somatic Experiencing — treats a particular psychological or medical condition.
Some areas of the research are also considerably stronger than others, and the authors identified substantial variation between studies.
The value of this research is therefore not in proving a particular therapeutic method, but in providing broad evidence that touch itself can have measurable effects on physical and mental wellbeing.
The original research
Packheiser, J., Hartmann, H., Fredriksen, K., Gazzola, V., Keysers, C. & Michon, F. (2024). A systematic review and multivariate meta-analysis of the physical and mental health benefits of touch interventions. Nature Human Behaviour, 8, 1088–1107.
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