The social buffering of pain by affective touch: a laser-evoked potential study in romantic couples.

Mariana Von Mohr,Aikaterini Fotopoulou,Brianna Beck,Charlotte Krahé

doi:10.1093/scan/nsy085

Mariana Von Mohr, Aikaterini Fotopoulou + Show 2 more

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https://doi.org/10.1093/scan/nsy085

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Abstract

Pain is modulated by social context. Recent neuroimaging studies have shown that romantic partners can provide a potent form of social support during pain. However, such studies have only focused on passive support, finding a relatively late-onset modulation of pain-related neural processing. In this study, we examined for the first time dynamic touch by one’s romantic partner as an active form of social support. Specifically, 32 couples provided social, active, affective (vs active but neutral) touch according to the properties of a specific C-tactile afferent pathway to their romantic partners, who then received laser-induced pain. We measured subjective pain ratings and early N1 and later N2-P2 laser-evoked potentials (LEPs) to noxious stimulation, as well as individual differences in adult attachment style. We found that affective touch from one’s partner reduces subjective pain ratings and similarly attenuates LEPs both at earlier (N1) and later (N2-P2) stages of cortical processing. Adult attachment style did not affect LEPs, but attachment anxiety had a moderating role on pain ratings. This is the first study to show early neural modulation of pain by active, partner touch, and we discuss these findings in relation to the affective and social modulation of sensory salience.

Highlights

Social bonding and support is important for human wellbeing (Berscheid, 2003; Ditzen & Heinrichs, 2014; Uchino, 2006)
While there was no main effect of affective touch on pain in this study and late, cortical responses to pain were not reliably affected, it remains possible that slow affective touch provided by a romantic partner, where social trust and attachment is already established, might impact higher-order pain regulation, as captured by later laser-evoked potentials (LEPs) components, i.e. the N2-P2 complex
While passive social support from one’s romantic partner can have pain-attenuating effects and corresponding modulation of neural responses (Eisenberger et al, 2011; Goldstein et al, 2018; Krahé et al, 2015), little is known about the effects of active partner support on pain

Summary

Introduction

Social bonding and support is important for human wellbeing (Berscheid, 2003; Ditzen & Heinrichs, 2014; Uchino, 2006). Slow (at 1-10 cm/s velocities), light-pressure (≈0.4N), dynamic (moving along the skin) touch has been shown to communicate social support (Kirsch et al, 2017) and reduce social pain (von Mohr et al, 2017) in comparison to faster, but otherwise identical, active touch. It seems that there may be a dedicated neurophysiological system, the C tactile (CT) system, coding this particular type of affective touch A romantic partner’s slow affective touch can be more powerful as affective touch is central to intimate, romantic relationships (Suvilehto, Glerean, Dunbar, Hari, & Nummenmaa, 2015) and the regulatory role of touch seems to be mediated by psychological intimacy (Debrot, Schoebi, Perrez, & Horn, 2013)

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