Sensitivity To Touch - The Fetal Senses

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Sensitivity To TouchThe maternal womb is an optimal, stimulating, interactive environment for human development. Activity never ceases and a fetus is never isolated. Touch, the first sense, is the cornerstone of human experience and communication, beginning in the womb (Montagu, 1978). 

Just before 8 weeks gestational age, the first sensitivity to touch manifests in a set of protective movements to avoid a mere hair stroke on the cheek. Skin sensitivity quickly extends to the genital area (10 weeks), palms (11 weeks), and soles (12 weeks). These areas of first sensitivity are the ones which will have the greatest number and variety of sensory receptors in adults. By 17 weeks, all parts of the abdomen and buttocks are sensitive. Skin is marvelously complex, containing a hundred varieties of cells which seem especially sensitive to heat, cold, pressure and pain. 

By 32 weeks, nearly every part of the body is sensitive to the same light stroke of a single hair. Your baby uses this newfound sense of touch to explore his/her environment in the womb by stroking his or her face, sucking on a thumb, touching the rest of his/her body, touching the uterine wall and the umbilical cord.

Another study, using 4-D scans, published in 2013 by Durham and Lancaster universities “found, for the first time, that a fetus was able to predict, rather than react to, his/her own hand movements towards his/her mouth as they entered the later stages of gestation compared to earlier in a pregnancy”. This showed that, in the womb, babies open their mouths before bringing their hands to their mouths. Touch, the strongest sense at birth, is a critical survival sense and is the main way in which infants learn about their environment and bond with other people. Most of what a newborn learns about the world is learned through touch—holding, caressing, dressing, diapering, cuddling, etc.

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VIRTUE BABY now stands ahead as a Non-Governmental Organization guided by health care professionals, spiritual guides, aspiring couples, yoga experts and physiotherapists.

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