Touch in Psychotherapy: Experiences, desires and attitudes in a large population survey

The therapeutic effects of touch have been long reported. However, in the field of psychotherapy touch is the exception and talking therapies are the norm. Critically, evidence on clients’ experiences and perspectives of touch during psychotherapy is scarce and reliant on small samples. Moreover, despite converging evidence on the associations between touch and attachment, research on attachment traits and perceptions of psychotherapeutic touch is lacking. Here, we utilised the largest-to-date, UK survey on touch (N = 39254), identifying 6878 individuals reporting having received psychological therapy in the last 10 years, to explore 1) the perceived quantity and affective quality of therapeutic touch experiences, and 2) clients’ desire to be touched. We hypothesised that the above experiences and desires are moderated by therapeutic modality, adult attachment style dimensions and general touch attitudes. We found that 30% of the responders reported physical contact with their therapist, 70% of the sample reported that touch communicated support by the therapist, while 4% of clients reported it was inappropriate. In addition, higher scores in attachment-avoidance were negatively associated with affective quality of touch experiences. In relation to touch desire, 40% of our sample wanted their therapist to touch them, with individuals scoring higher on attachment-anxiety style being more likely to show desire for touch, whereas attachment avoidance reduced desire. Having cognitive-behavioural therapy reduced the desire for touch, whereas having body-oriented therapy increased it. This unprecedented, large scale data warrant further investigation on the potential usefulness of touch interventions in certain clients and in given modalities.