Assessing affective touch in early caregiving: Development and validation of the Caregiver-Child Affective Touch Assessment (CCATA)

Abstract

Affective touch plays a pivotal role in nonverbal communication between caregivers and young children, supporting the development of emotion regulation and socioemotional functioning. This exploratory study examines the initial development and validation of the Caregiver-Child Affective Touch Assessment (CCATA), an observational measure designed to classify the quality of caregiver touch during interactions with children aged 2 to 5 years. Thirty mother-child dyads were observed during two structured tasks, generating 1,066 coded instances of touch. Inter-rater reliability was very good, with intraclass correlation coefficients ranging from 0.86 to 0.94. An exploratory principal component analysis suggested a three-component structure of maternal touch, reflecting regulatory/controlling, interactive/pragmatic, and affective/spontaneous dimensions. These dimensions reflect distinct caregiving strategies and communicative functions of touch. The CCATA also revealed significant associations with both maternal emotional availability and the use of disciplinary strategies. These findings support the CCATA as a reliable and theoretically grounded instrument for capturing the complexity of affective touch in early caregiving. Its application holds promise for both research and clinical interventions focused on caregiver-child relationships. Future studies should further examine the measure’s factorial structure, cross-cultural validity, and predictive value in developmental outcomes.