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Using Citizen Science During COVID-19 to Illuminate the Stress-Alleviating Effects of Daily Touch on Hormonal Biomarkers and Subjective Measures of Well-Being
15 Pages Posted: 28 Mar 2022
More...Abstract
Background: Social interactions and particularly social affectionate touch are vital for mental and physical health. Potential neuroendocrine mechanisms for these salubrious social effects include the release of oxytocin and its regulation of the stress axes. However, to date, no study probed the association between diurnal and momentary endogenous oxytocin levels and stress responses during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Methods: During the first wave of the Covid-19 pandemic in a large cross-sectional online survey (N = 1,050) anxiety and depression symptoms were measured with the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS), loneliness with the University of California, Los Angeles Loneliness scale (UCLA Loneliness) and attitude towards social touch with the Social Touch Questionnaire (STQ). Additionally, N = 247 participants completed ecologically momentary assessments (EMA) over two days with six daily assessments by answering smartphone-based questions on affectionate touch and their momentary mental state as well as providing concomitant saliva samples for cortisol and oxytocin assessment.
Outcomes: Analyses from hierarchical multilevel models (HLM) show that affectionate touch was associated with lower momentary anxiety, Covid-19 related burden, stress, and cortisol as well as with higher oxytocin levels and happiness.
Interpretation: Our results suggest that in times of pandemic and lockdown affectionate touch is linked to higher endogenous oxytocin and might buffer stress on a subjective and hormonal level. The results of these large-scale daily hormone and mood assessments have immediate implications for preventing mental burden during social contact restrictions.
Trial Registration Details: The study was registered online at https://www.drks.de/drks_web/navigate.do?navigationId=trial.HTML&TRIAL_ID=DRKS00021671.
Funding Information: This study was funded by a grant from the German Research Foundation (DFG, as part of a sub-project in SFB 1158 awarded to B. Ditzen) and the German Psychological Society (DGPs, Corona Scholarship) awarded to D. Hopf and E. Schneider. M. Eckstein received a Young Seed Grant by the German Psychological Society (DFG SFB 1158), funds from the Dres. Majic/Majic Schlez-Foundation and support from the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD).
Declaration of Interests: Authors declare that there is no conflict of interest.
Ethics Approval Statement: For this study ethical approval was granted from the ethics committee of the Heidelberg University Medical Faculty (approval no. S-214/2020). All participants provided written informed consent.
Keywords: Covid-19, self-reported anxiety and burden, affectionate touch, oxytocin, cortisol, ecological momentary assessment
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