No Human Contact
As I type these words, we are about a month or so into what is a new experience for us. It might not even be an exaggeration to suggest that we are experiencing a new way of life. Among other things, our language and our actions have changed.
Just a few weeks ago, I don’t think I’d ever heard the phrase “social distancing.” Now, we are not only using that phrase regularly, we are practicing it.
Somewhere recently I heard about a woman who carries a tape measure with her wherever she goes in order to make sure that there is at least a distance of six feet between her and the people around her. While most of us do not go to that length, we do make some effort to keep an “appropriate distance” between us and others.
When we turn on our televisions and/or use other forms of media, we discover that people who are trying to get us to purchase their products and/or take advantage of the services they offer have found innovative ways to do those things. A phrase that keeps popping up is that all of this can be done with –
no human contact.
I’ve seen information that informs me that I can purchase anything from groceries to a new automobile without physically interacting with another person. Because of a medical situation I had recently, it was necessary to make an appointment with our family physician. The entire “appointment” was done via a video hookup. I was in our house and he was in his office. There was no human contact. .
Is the loss of the opportunity for human touch such a big deal? The following information can be obtained from multiple sources. The source quoted here is stpauls.vxcommunity.com. Please consider carefully two paragraphs from an article entitled “US Experiment on infants withholding affection.”
In the United States, 1944, an experiment was conducted on 40 newborn infants to determine whether individuals could thrive alone on basic physiological needs without affection. Twenty newborn infants were housed in a special facility where they had caregivers who would go in to feed them, bathe them and change their diapers, but they would do nothing else. The caregivers had been instructed not to look at or touch the babies more than what was necessary, never communicating with them. All their physical needs were attended to scrupulously and the environment was kept sterile, none of the babies becoming ill.
The experiment was halted after four months, by which time, at least half of the babies had died at that point. At least two more died even after being rescued and brought into a more natural familial environment. There was no physiological cause for the babies’ deaths; they were all physically very healthy. Before each baby died, there was a period where they would stop verbalizing and trying to engage with their caregivers, generally stop moving, nor cry or even change expression; death would follow shortly. The babies who had “given up” before being rescued, died in the same manner, even though they had been removed from the experimental conditions.
Again, you can find information about this experiment from a variety of sources. You can also find information about other situations that show that the lack of human contact has a devastating effect on infants.
However, I think that at least most of us would agree that the importance of human contact is not confined to the period of time when we are in our infancy. Let me illustrate that by asking a few questions:
What is communicated when you give or receive a hug, handshake, or a pat on the back? What does it mean to you when somebody you love reaches over to you just to hold your hand or give you one of those little “love pats?” For those of us who are parents or grandparents, what does it mean to us when a small (or maybe not so small anymore) child or grandchild crawls up in our lap?
I’m more than ready for all of the restrictions caused by our current situation to be over. I’m tired of the daily dose of negative information. I’m tired of “running scared.” I’m tired of a lot of things.
Most of all I’m ready for the time when there can be appropriate human contact. All of us need that.
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AUTHOR: Jim Faughn
