Topic: interpersonal touch

Differences in tactile sensory processing and social interaction have been reported in the autistic population. Here, we investigated two aspects of interpersonal touch: the pleasantness of being touched and the interpretation of social touch. We used a set of six naturalistic touch expressions, communicating happiness, sadness, attention, calming, love, and gratitude. We recruited participants from the local community or online and divided them into self-reported autistic and neurotypical groups. They completed a touch communication task, and a pleasantness rating task, either in-person or on