German neuroscientists have described how the brain reacts to a person trying to tick himself. They also reveal the most "itting" parts of our body.
Humans are not the only mammals that itch. It exists in dolphins , dogs, rats and chimpanzees. However, little is known about science about the literal ridiculous question of tickling. For example, it was not clear until now why some touches make us laugh, while others are very unpleasant.
It is not clear why some people are afraid of being tickled, while some are unresponsive, why some parts of our bodies are more sensitive to touch and others are less sensitive. But the most intriguing mystery is: Why don’t we laugh when we tickled ourselves?
The answer to this seemingly "naive" question requires a comprehensive study by scientists from the Bernstein Center for Computational Neuroscience (Germany). The results were published in Royal Society Philosophical Transactions B. Twelve volunteers participated in the precision experiments of neuroscientists.
This study includes several stages. Initially, participants were asked to expose their armpits and feet so that their partner could tickle them. Before that, the volunteers had some time to get to know each other. The whole process was taken with a camera: one aims at the face and the other aims at the part of the body that should be tickled.
By studying these videos, scientists found that, as expected, the first reaction to being scratched is a change in facial expression. After about 300 milliseconds, a smile begins to form, followed by a change in breathing. After another 200 milliseconds, the subjects began to laugh. Volunteers were then asked to assess how itchy they were when they touched certain parts of their body. The most "itting" thing is the feet.
In the second part of the experiment, participants were asked to tickle themselves while their partner did the same thing to them. Here, the researchers found an interesting point: As in the first part of the experiment, the laughter sounds made when touching the same part of the body are reduced: if he is "helped" at the same time, people will react less to being itched by another person.
According to scientists, this effect is due to the fact that when we touch our own body, our brains send signals through it, temporarily suppressing their sensitivity to touch. Otherwise, we giggle while wearing socks or scratching our armpits.
By the way, people with so-called influences of paranoia can laugh out loud even if they touch themselves. This obstacle is characterized by the fact that in one person's eyes, it is not him who controls his behavior, but others (special services, aliens, etc.). This syndrome also includes the illusion of psychological influence (“voices in the mind”).
