About Sensory Defensiveness... and AUTISM

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http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/7992299.stm

 

Scientists find 'pleasure nerves'

Mothers use touch to sooth their babies

Scientists say they understand more about how the body responds to pleasurable

touch.

A team, including scientists from the Unilever company, have identified a class

of nerve fibres in the skin which specifically send pleasure messages.

And people had to be stroked at a certain speed - 4-5cm per second - to activate

the pleasure sensation.

They say the study, published in Nature Neuroscience, could help understand how

touch sustains human relationships.

There are some mechanisms in place that are associated with behaviour and

reward which are there to ensure relationships continue

Professor Francis McGlone

For many years, scientists have been trying to understand the mechanisms behind

how the body experiences pain, and the nerves involved in conveying those

messages to the brain.

This is because people can suffer a great deal.

Neuropathy, where the peripheral nervous system is damaged, can be very painful

and sometimes the messaging system goes wrong a people feel pain even when there

is no cause.

Hairy skin

But the researchers involved in this work were looking to understand the

opposite sensation - pleasure.

This research, which also involved experts at the University of Gothenburg in

Sweden and at the University of North Carolina, recorded nerve responses in 20

people.

They then tested how people responded to having their forearm skin stroked at a

range of different speeds.

They identified " C-tactile " nerve fibres as those stimulated when people said a

touch had been pleasant.

If the stroke was faster or slower than the optimum speed, the touch was not

pleasurable and the nerve fibres were not activated.

The scientists also discovered that the C-tactile nerve fibres are only present

on hairy skin, and are not found on the hand.

Professor Francis McGlone, now based at Unilever after an academic career where

he carried out research into nerve response, says this is likely to be a

deliberate " design " .

" We believe this could be Mother Nature's way of ensuring that mixed messages

are not sent to the brain when it is in use as a functional tool. "

He said the speed at which people found arm-stroking pleasurable was the same as

that which a mother uses to comfort a baby, or couples use to show affection.

Professor McGlone said it was part of the evolutionary mechanism that sustained

relationships between adults, or with children.

" Our primary impulse as humans is procreation, but there are some mechanisms in

place that are associated with behaviour and reward which are there to ensure

relationships continue. "

Love, Gabby. :0)

http://stemcellforautism.blogspot.com/

 

" I know of nobody who is purely Autistic or purely neurotypical. Even God had

some Autistic moments, which is why the planets all spin. " ~ Jerry Newport