Wednesday, September 27, 2023
SCIENMAG: Latest Science and Health News
No Result
View All Result
  • Login
  • HOME PAGE
  • BIOLOGY
  • CHEMISTRY AND PHYSICS
  • MEDICINE
    • Cancer
    • Infectious Emerging Diseases
  • SPACE
  • TECHNOLOGY
  • CONTACT US
  • HOME PAGE
  • BIOLOGY
  • CHEMISTRY AND PHYSICS
  • MEDICINE
    • Cancer
    • Infectious Emerging Diseases
  • SPACE
  • TECHNOLOGY
  • CONTACT US
No Result
View All Result
Scienmag - Latest science news from science magazine
No Result
View All Result
Home SCIENCE NEWS Biology

Holding hands can sync brainwaves, ease pain, study shows

March 1, 2018
in Biology
0
Share on FacebookShare on Twitter
IMAGE

Credit: Pavel Goldstein

Reach for the hand of a loved one in pain and not only will your breathing and heart rate synchronize with theirs, your brain wave patterns will couple up too, according to a study published this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).

The study, by researchers with the University of Colorado Boulder and University of Haifa, also found that the more empathy a comforting partner feels for a partner in pain, the more their brainwaves fall into sync. And the more those brain waves sync, the more the pain goes away.

"We have developed a lot of ways to communicate in the modern world and we have fewer physical interactions," said lead author Pavel Goldstein, a postdoctoral pain researcher in the Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience Lab at CU Boulder. "This paper illustrates the power and importance of human touch."

The study is the latest in a growing body of research exploring a phenomenon known as "interpersonal synchronization," in which people physiologically mirror the people they are with. It is the first to look at brain wave synchronization in the context of pain, and offers new insight into the role brain-to-brain coupling may play in touch-induced analgesia, or healing touch.

Goldstein came up with the experiment after, during the delivery of his daughter, he discovered that when he held his wife's hand, it eased her pain.

"I wanted to test it out in the lab: Can one really decrease pain with touch, and if so, how?"

He and his colleagues at University of Haifa recruited 22 heterosexual couples, age 23 to 32 who had been together for at least one year and put them through several two-minute scenarios as electroencephalography (EEG) caps measured their brainwave activity. The scenarios included sitting together not touching; sitting together holding hands; and sitting in separate rooms. Then they repeated the scenarios as the woman was subjected to mild heat pain on her arm.

Merely being in each other's presence, with or without touch, was associated with some brain wave synchronicity in the alpha mu band, a wavelength associated with focused attention. If they held hands while she was in pain, the coupling increased the most.

Researchers also found that when she was in pain and he couldn't touch her, the coupling of their brain waves diminished. This matched the findings from a previously published paper from the same experiment which found that heart rate and respiratory synchronization disappeared when the male study participant couldn't hold her hand to ease her pain.

"It appears that pain totally interrupts this interpersonal synchronization between couples and touch brings it back," says Goldstein.

Subsequent tests of the male partner's level of empathy revealed that the more empathetic he was to her pain the more their brain activity synced. The more synchronized their brains, the more her pain subsided.

How exactly could coupling of brain activity with an empathetic partner kill pain?

More studies are needed to find out, stressed Goldstein. But he and his co-authors offer a few possible explanations. Empathetic touch can make a person feel understood, which in turn – according to previous studies – could activate pain-killing reward mechanisms in the brain.

"Interpersonal touch may blur the borders between self and other," the researchers wrote.

The study did not explore whether the same effect would occur with same-sex couples, or what happens in other kinds of relationships. The takeaway for now, Pavel said: Don't underestimate the power of a hand-hold.

"You may express empathy for a partner's pain, but without touch it may not be fully communicated," he said.

###

Irit Weissman-Fogel, of University of Haifa, and Guillaume Dumas and Simone Shamay-Tsoory, of Florida Atlantic University, contributed to this study. It was supported with a grant from the Binational Science Foundation.

Contact:

Pavel Goldstein
goldsteinpav@gmail.com

Lisa Marshall, CU Boulder media relations
lisa.marshall@colorado.edu
303-492-3115

Media Contact

Lisa Ann Marshall
lisa.marshall@colorado.edu
303-492-3115
@cubouldernews

http://www.colorado.edu/news

Related Journal Article

http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1703643115

Share25Tweet16Share4ShareSendShare
  • blank

    Null results research now published by major behavioral medicine journal

    1052 shares
    Share 421 Tweet 263
  • New findings on hair loss in men

    78 shares
    Share 31 Tweet 20
  • A novel role discovered for vagus nerve

    65 shares
    Share 26 Tweet 16
  • Archaeologists discover world’s oldest wooden structure

    68 shares
    Share 27 Tweet 17
  • Grant awarded to University of Louisville law professor will fund climate adaptation project

    71 shares
    Share 28 Tweet 18
  • Unleashing the power of AI to track animal behavior

    64 shares
    Share 26 Tweet 16
ADVERTISEMENT

About us

We bring you the latest science news from best research centers and universities around the world. Check our website.

Latest NEWS

Null results research now published by major behavioral medicine journal

New findings on hair loss in men

Archaeologists discover world’s oldest wooden structure

Subscribe to Blog via Email

Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Join 208 other subscribers

© 2023 Scienmag- Science Magazine: Latest Science News.

No Result
View All Result
  • HOME PAGE
  • BIOLOGY
  • CHEMISTRY AND PHYSICS
  • MEDICINE
    • Cancer
    • Infectious Emerging Diseases
  • SPACE
  • TECHNOLOGY
  • CONTACT US

© 2023 Scienmag- Science Magazine: Latest Science News.

Welcome Back!

Login to your account below

Forgotten Password?

Retrieve your password

Please enter your username or email address to reset your password.

Log In