Benefits of Baby Massage

There are many benefits that come from baby massage but perhaps the most important is demonstrating Nurturing Touch, which can be provided for all babies in various forms.

Whatever your circumstance, be it a premature baby, a baby with additional needs or that you’re experiencing postnatal depression, nurturing touch can be given to communicate love and security.

Benefits to your baby

Interaction – promotes bonding, communication, use of all the senses, nurturing touch, early contact with both parents, imitation (and much more)

Stimulation – Systems of the body, including the immune and digestive system, vestibular system (coordination and balance), language development, muscular development and tone, growth, elimination, connections between neurons (stroking promotes and quickens the growth of the myelin sheath).

Relief – gas and colic, constipation and elimination, gastrointestinal (digestive) cramps, growing pains, physical and psychological tension and so on

Relaxation – Improved sleeping patterns, increased environmental coping mechanisms, self-regulation (the ability to calm oneself), reduction of stress levels and stress hormones (cortisol and norepinephrin), increased levels of relaxing or anti-stress hormones (oxytocin and serotonin), higher levels of dopamine and so on.

Benefits to yourself

Increased understanding of your baby, reading and respecting cues, bonding, improved self-esteem and confidence, early involvement for fathers, relaxation, stimulates lactation, decrease in post natal depression and much more.

Research

Some relevant research from the Touch Research Institute that have tested baby massage:

Neurophysiological Development in Premature Infants following Stimulation.
Ruth Rice (Dallas, Texas)

Tactile-kinesthetic stimulation was given to 15 premature infants to determine effects on neuro-physiological development. The mothers of the infants were trained to administer the treatment for 15 minutes four times a day for 1 month, beginning the day the infant arrived home from the hospital. When each infant in the study (15 experimental and 14 control) was 4 months, he/she was examined by a paediatrician, a psychologies, and a paediatric nurse, who had no knowledge of whether the infant was experimental or control. The infant’s neuro-physiological development, weight, length, head circumference, and mental and motor development were assessed.

The results indicated that the experimental infants made significant gains in neuro-physiological development, in weight gain, and in mental development. The findings indicate that the early and systematic stimulation provided by the mothers can enhance development of premature infants.

Development Psychology 1977, Vol 13; no.1:69-76
Touch Research Institute

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