Babies as young as 4 months old differentiate between a parent’s hug and a stranger’s, new research finds. An infant’s first year is an important time of development, both physiologically and emotionally.
It is also a period where verbal language is barely emerging, and much is unknown about the ways in which the connection between parent and child establishes.
Touch appears to play a pivotal role in this preverbal conversation, and scientists from Toho University in Tokyo, Japan, have recently published the results of a study that quantifies the manner in which infants physiologically respond to being held and hugged.