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The Touch Taboo in
Psychotherapy and
Everyday Life
Tamar Swade
First published 2020
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
and by Routledge
52 Vanderbilt Avenue, New York, NY 10017
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa
business
© 2020 Tamar Swade
The right of Tamar Swade to be identified as author of this
work has been asserted by her in accordance with sections
77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted
or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic,
mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented,
including photocopying and recording, or in any information
storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from
the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be
trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for
identification and explanation without intent to infringe.
British Library Cataloguing-in- Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British
Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-in- Publication Data
A catalog record has been requested for this book
ISBN: 978 - 0 -367-23402-7 (hbk)
ISBN: 978 - 0 -367-23405- 8 (pbk)
ISBN: 978 - 0 - 429-27969- 0 (ebk)
Typeset in Times New Roman
by codeMantra
Taylor & Francis
Taylor & Francis Group
http://taylorandfrancis.com
In memory of Ruth Swade, a remarkable human.
Contents
Acknowledgements��������������������������������������������������������� ix
Introduction ������������������������������������������������������������������� 1
SECTION 1
Touch in everyday life ������������������������������������������� 5
���������������������������������������������������
�������������������������������������������������
���������������������������������������������������������������
���������������������������������������������������������
5 The origins of attitudes to touch; how tactile
habits are formed���������������������������������������������������������� 92
6 Touch in everyday life; what ‘ordinary people’
(non-clients) said about touch�������������������������������������� 104
SECTION II
Touch in psychotherapy ������������������������������������� 117
7 Can touch help or hinder therapy? clients’
experience .������������������������������������������������������������������� 119
�����������������������������������������
viii Contents
��������������
������������������������
�������
���������������������������������������
�������
Bibliography����������������������������������������������������������������� 221
Index���������������������������������������������������������������������������� 281
Acknowledgements
Thank you, first, to the participants in this research whose remark-
able wisdom, insight and articulacy were the major spur to my writ-
ing this book.
Thank you to my superbly gifted readers who commented on
some or all of the various drafts of the manuscript: Dario Swade,
whose zoom-lens brain enables him to leap about in the ideological
forest canopy like a monkey-acrobat — seeing the overview, hold-
ing long theme-trails in mind — and at the same time, eagle-eyed,
notice details and dive down to the forest floor to retrieve a missing
comma or colon; Danny Gluckstein who read some of the origi-
nal book, immediately got the gist, and said astutely, ‘This is two
books’; Ruth Thackeray, professional copy-editor whom nothing
escapes, and who alerted me to an article by John Walsh (2000)
according to which three kinds of people are close to extinction:
the rag-and-bone man, the spinster, and the copy-editor; Ruth is
living proof that at least one example of the latter species survives;
Ann Harries, my novelist ‘besty’, whose appreciation of prose style
(especially mine) is a delight; David Drake, another with awesome
awareness of fine detail; supermind Richard Stevens whose enthu-
siasm for the book was so heartening; Elana Dallas and Sophie
Khan, who struggled loyally through some of the very first draft;
Angela Hobsbaum who applied her unerring acumen and expertise
to proofreading the final draft; and Ian Horton who applauded the
original dissertation on which this book is based. Any errors in the
text are entirely mine and nothing to do with them.
Huge thanks to Doron Swade, effortlessly brilliant and articu-
late, for invaluable help and advice, particularly when the going
was tough, and to other long-suffering friends and family for cru-
cial help, encouragement and support — Joanne Zimmerman, Ruth
x Acknowledgements
Swade, Sarah Sceats, Ilan Lazarus, Shelley Swade, Sally Donati,
Jill Norman, Sheena Roberts, Tim Megarry, Anousheh Bromfield,
Lynn Kramer, Hilary Henderson, Janet Riddett, Jenny West, Sue
Ellman and Sarah Harrison, to mention but a few.
Thanks to the 70 friends and associates who participated so
consummately in research on the title of this book; to Tessa, Wilf
and Alice Hatchett and their lovely Mum Vicky for essential enter-
tainment and light relief; to extraordinary therapist Chris Nikoloff
from whom I learned so much about therapy and who first intro-
duced me to Ashley Montagu’s glorious book about touch; to my
editor, Alec Selwyn, ever kind, friendly and unflappable; and to
the virtuoso internet sleuths of the British Library — Paul Allchin,
Vera Eterovic, Lorena Garcia Moreno and Lesley Haji-Gholam —
who did not try to teach me how to work the library computers but
instead understood at once that I was technologically a lost cause
and traced obscure books and articles for me.
And thanks as big as the universe to wondrous Peter Kent for dec-
ades of unfailing support, computer repair and maintenance, ideas,
jokes, printing, photocopying, hugs, hot-water-bottle-making and
a million other feats of ballastry.
Love, and hugs if you like them.
Tamar Swade
Introduction
It was puzzlement that first led me to explore the issue of touch. As
an undergraduate psychotherapist, certain aspects of traditional
psychotherapy struck me as distinctly odd. One of these oddities,
it seemed to me, was the blanket taboo against physical contact
between therapist and client.
When I engage in non-erotic touch (a hug, for example) with
someone I like and trust, I feel happy, healthy, alive, and my world is
rich and colourful. If I am worried, sad or irritable, touch can allay
these feelings and restore my sense of well-being. Since these kinds
of positive feeling are major goals of any therapy, I was curious as
to whether my own experience of affectionate physical contact was
unusual or was more generally shared. If the latter, then therapy
clients (and anyone else) might increase their well-being through
experiencing touch; and if this were the case then withholding
touch when it could help would be neglectful of clients’ needs and
might diminish my effectiveness as a therapist.
I am positing in the above that clients do not transform into some
alien species on entering the therapist’s room, that they instead
take their human needs and personalities with them into therapy.
Therefore, if ordinary people like me and others of my acquaint-
ance benefit from physical contact in everyday life, it seemed prob-
able that some clients would find it helpful in therapy. In order to
explore this hypothesis I divided my material into two sections. The
first (Chapters 1–6) investigates responses to touch in everyday life;
the second (Chapters 7–12) examines whether or how much these
responses transfer to therapy.
In more detail, for readers who like to be forewarned:
The first three chapters present an overview of research into
touch spanning the 20th century and the early 21st.
2 Introduction
Chapter 1 looks at research conducted with animal subjects.
Readers concerned about animal welfare will be horrified by the
cruelty of some of the experiments described. However, the cruelty
has irrevocably occurred and in my view it would add insult to in-
jury to disregard the results of this research; at least the animals in
question will not have suffered and died to completely no avail if
the findings to which they have so signally contributed are used to
advance understanding. And early animal investigations into touch
are not only important historically but offer striking insights into
human as well as animal tactile needs.
Chapter 2 moves the focus from animals to humans and explores
the potent effects on us of both touch and touch deprivation.
Chapter 3 deals with the devastating, often lifelong, impacts of
negative physical contact, in particular physical and sexual abuse —
for although this book is about humane touch, the picture of human
tactility would be incomplete without mention of the malign touch
perpetrated by psychologically ill or underdeveloped persons.
The next four chapters draw on my own research in the form of
interviews with people from varied backgrounds, henceforth called
‘participants’ or ‘interviewees’:
Chapter 4 begins to explore the range of human touch habits —
the varied amounts and types of touch we experience in child-
hood and later. These are placed on a tactility scale ranging from
‘non-tactile’ at one end to ‘fully tactile’ at the other.
Chapter 5 asks whether the societies in which we live influence
our tactile attitudes and behaviours. For example, are Britons in-
deed less tactile than French or South American peoples, as popu-
lar belief has it — and might such cultural differences have bearing
on the touch taboo in psychotherapy?
Chapter 6 presents participants’ experience of touch in everyday
life, their sensations, feelings and thoughts in response to physical
contact. Social workers, educators, medical professionals... — anyone
in a caring role — may find this chapter particularly relevant.
In Section 2, Chapter 7 again presents my own research in the
form of excerpts from interviews, in this case with clients who had
experienced touch in psychotherapy. For therapists and counsellors
this chapter is probably the nub of the book, so these readers may
wish to start with it.
Chapter 8 outlines the rich and detailed literature on therapeutic
touch that exists to date.
Introduction 3
Chapter 9 traces the origins of the touch taboo in psychotherapy —
if the benefits of physical contact are as marked as the research sug-
gests, how is it that the taboo exists at all?
Chapter 10 proposes counterarguments to the touch taboo.
Chapter 11 examines criteria for the safe and effective use of
touch in therapy.
Chapter 12 suggests ways of dismantling the touch taboo in
everyday life and in therapy for those who wish to do so; and
Chapter 13 presents brief overall conclusions and final
thoughts.
Dramatis personae
Most of the persons mentioned in this book were research partic-
ipants; a comparatively small number were therapy clients or case
studies; and a handful are people I have known and observed in my
non-work life.
I was enormously lucky in the individuals who volunteered as
participants in this research. Their words were so wise and inspir-
ing, and so valuable a contribution to current psychology, that I
thought it a loss to the world not to make them more widely known.
Hence this book.
I have changed participants’ names in all but a few instances
when they preferred to be quoted under their own name. I have also
sometimes changed identifying details in their narratives in order
to ensure their anonymity.
Verbatim reporting; use of italics
Besides the normal uses of italics, all words quoted verbatim from
participants’ interviews are in ‘italics and inverted commas’. The
only exception to strict verbatim reporting of interviews is the
omission of an occasional ‘um’ or ‘er’ for the sake of continuity.
Gender pronouns
I have not changed the gender of the actual research participants
interviewed. However, when describing hypothetical persons I
have alternated the use of ‘he/him’ and ‘she/her’. As far as possible,
I have attempted to divide the two descriptions evenly.
4 Introduction
IMPORTANT NOTE ABOUT TOUCH
Unless otherwise stated the ‘touch’ referred to in this book is
non-sexual/non-erotic. It includes any form of physical con-
tact by means of which humans express warmth and caring —
‘conversational’ touch (the brief touches, for example on arm
or shoulder, that sometimes occur during conversation);
more prolonged contact with a body-part, such as hand-
holding, a hand resting on someone’s arm, or an arm round
shoulders; and more or less full body contact, as in hugging,
holding, rocking, cradling … (Hunter & Struve, 1998:169–74;
Smith, 1998b).
Section 1
Touch in everyday life
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