Does your child hate to have his feet touched? Do certain fabrics bother him because they are scratchy? Does your child refuse to touch anything sticky, slimy, or dirty with his hands? Does your daughter cringe when you stroke her face?

It could be that your child has a sensory motor integration deficit known as tactile defensiveness or touch sensitivity.

What is Touch Sensitivity?

The sense of touch is essential for normal social and emotional development. It is this system that allows us to make the deepest connections with others. It is through touch that the mother and child bond to each other. We connect most closely with our spouses through touch.

Touch also serves a protective function. It is through tactile discomfort or pain that we realize that things like fire are dangerous. Painful or unpleasant touch experiences tell us to prepare for a physical threat that might require a need to run away or retaliate.

In some people this tactile sensory system is not functioning properly. These people experience pain or distress from touch sensations that other people find non-threatening or even pleasant. These people have sensory integration disorder known as tactile defensiveness or touch sensitivity.

Children with touch sensitivity are often in the state of "red alert". Many of the sensations that we take as meaningless, they view as a physical threat. Children with touch sensitivity also experience tactile sensations differently than others. A sensation that we would experience as soft may be painful to them. The result is that often their behavior is affected. Casual contact can cause what others view as extreme and inappropriate reactions. These children may whine cling lash out or run away as a result of normal things in their environment.

Sensory motor integration deficits need not affect a child's learning ability, but the resulting reaction often does. A child with touch sensitivity is constantly on the defense. He can be emotionally insecure and extremely distractible. This is one of the ways that tactile defensiveness differs from ADD ADHD. ADHD children have difficulty sustaining attention, but they are not more easily distracted than other children. Small stimuli that would not affect an ADHD child who is engaged in an activity, may cause disturb a touch sensitive child.

To give you an idea of how these children experience the world, imagine the feeling you have when someone scrapes his nails along a blackboard, or the feeling you have when you cut your nails too short. This is how a touch sensitive child might experience a warm caress. There is a difference, however. When you cut your nails too short, it bothers you for a while, but the discomfort goes away. If a child is touch sensitive, the discomfort never goes away.

The child may not be able to wear his dress pants because the feel of wool is too uncomfortable to bear. He may not be able to concentrate in school because he is enduring the hardness of the chair or the rush of air blowing on him from the ventilation system. He may be quick to lash out when another child bumps him, because of the perceived attack by the other child. He may be unable to make friends because of the fear of being bumped prevents him from interacting in a normal fashion.

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