As our society becomes increasingly digital, physical human contact seems to be steadily decreasing – a shift that may have profound implications for our mental and emotional well-being. While there is a lot of laboratory data implying that interpersonal touch effectively reduces stress and supports social bonding, robust real-world data remains surprisingly sparse.
TouchNet is an ambitious research initiative, funded by the European Research Council (ERC). Our mission is to move beyond laboratory settings to capture the spectrum of interpersonal touch in our daily lives. We furthermore aim to bridge the gap between real-world social experiences and the complex neural processes underlying human touch by combining large-scale field studies with state-of-the-art neuroscience.
Our Approach:
Real World Insights: We are building the world’s largest ecological database of interpersonal touch to understand the frequency, context and immediate effects of touch on our well-being.
Neural Mechanisms: We use advanced imaging technology to study interpersonal touch in the social brain, revealing how touch is mirrored in neural networks and shapes how we synchronize with others.
