ABSTRACT
Bodily contact is the most primitive form of social communication; it is found in very simple organisms, and in young children. Other forms of NVC are a later development both of evolution and growth. Primates use a number of different forms of bodily contact – infants cling to their mothers, and engage in rough-and-tumble play with each other; adults groom each other; presenting, mounting, and embracing take place between sexual partners; in dominance hierarchies rival males may bite, strike, and pull fur; greetings consist of genital and stomach nuzzling, kissing, embracing, and grooming. Bodily contact is involved in some of the most basic types of social contact – sex, feeding, fighting – as well as in sheer affiliative behaviour, such as grooming and play in primates.
