ArticlePhilosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences2022
The human tickle response and mechanisms of self-tickle suppression.
Article in Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 7 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
7 citing papers in PubMed, 11 citations in OpenAlex.
- Prediction error coding as the computational basis for nocifensive and nocifensive-like behaviors.Frontiers in neuroscience · 2026Article
- The extraordinary enigma of ordinary tickle behavior: Why gargalesis still puzzles neuroscience.Science advances · 2025Review
- Tickle fetishism: pleasure beyond playfulness.Frontiers in psychology · 2024Article
- Evolution of laughter from play.Communicative & integrative biology · 2024Article
- Effect of lite touch on the anxiety of low-risk pregnant women in the latent phase of childbirth: a randomized controlled trial.Frontiers in psychology · 2024Article
- Cracking the laugh code: laughter through the lens of biology, psychology and neuroscience.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2022Article
- The human tickle response and mechanisms of self-tickle suppression.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
5 authors at 2 institutions in 4 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
A tickle is a complex sensation: it occurs in response to touch but not unequivocally so, and makes us laugh albeit not when we self-tickle. We quantified human ticklishness by means of physiological, visual and acoustic measures alongside subjective reports, and assessed mechanisms of self-tickle suppression. Tickle responses arose faster than previously reported as changes in thoracic circumference and joyous facial expressions co-emerge approximately 300 ms after tickle onset and are followed by vocalizations starting after an additional 200 ms. The timing and acoustic properties of vocalizations tightly correlated with subjective reports: the faster, louder and higher-pitched participants laughed, the stronger they rated the experienced ticklishness. Externally evoked ticklishness is reduced by simultaneous self-tickling, whereby self-touch evokes stronger suppression than sole self-tickle movement without touch. We suggest that self-tickle suppression can be understood as broad attenuation of sensory temporally coincident inputs. Our study provides new insight on the nature of human ticklishness and the attenuating effects of self-tickling. This article is part of the theme issue 'Cracking the laugh code: laughter through the lens of biology, psychology and neuroscience'.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.