Maternal touch in object- and nonobject-oriented play interactions: A longitudinal study at 7 and 12 months

Social touch is a crucial part of how mothers interact with their infants, with different touch types serving distinct purposes in these exchanges. However, there is still a limited understanding of how mothers' touch behavior adapts to specific interactive tasks, particularly throughout infancy. To address this gap, we observed mother-infant dyads at 7 and 12 months during three structured social play tasks: (a) play with objects, (b) play without objects, and (c) play with a difficult object. Using an adapted version of the Ordinalized Maternal Touch Scale, we categorized every touch performed by the mother. The effect of the infant's age and play tasks on the proportion of time mothers touch their infants was evaluated using Bayesian beta mixed models, taking into account both the total quantity and the Ordinalized Maternal Touch Scale touch categories. Results showed that (a) the frequency of maternal touch is prevalent in dyadic interactions and lowered in triadic object play; (b) mothers used affectionate, static, and playful touch categories more often in dyadic play tasks; (c) in triadic play task, mothers used object-mediated touch more frequently; (d) the total frequency of maternal touch decreased across infant age, which was primarily due to a decrease in static and object-mediated touch; and (e) maternal touch varies depending on the complexity of object play task. Our findings suggested that the developmental trajectory of maternal touch behavior is modulated by the infant's evolving needs and the different challenges in object versus nonobject play tasks. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).