Cuddle Puddle

Cuddling permeates many of our closest relationships, whether platonic or romantic - but why? Cristen and Caroline investigate the nature and nurture of cuddling, why some people are now paying for a good snuggle and who wins the spooning battle of the sexes.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
Welcome to stuff Mom Never told you. From House top
works dot com. Hello, and welcome to the podcast. I'm
Kristen and I'm Caroline and Caroline. Today's topic is one
of those that I did not expect to find as

(00:24):
much research and in depth investigations on something as simplistic,
at least seemingly simplistic as cuddling. I know, well, I
was not surprised. I totally expected that there would be
plenty of first person accounts or anecdotal stories or even

(00:46):
think pieces and analysis about who cuddles and why. I
didn't expect. Similarly, I did not expect the actual amount
of academic research that's out there. But once I started
reading about cuddling and thought about all of the different
variations of cuddling, which I gotta say side note, cuddling

(01:08):
is like one of those like moist works for me? Yeah,
could why? But why is that because you're cuddling a verse?
I'm a verse too, Referring to the act of cuddling
is cutdling? Does it signify? I think, as my therapist
would say, Christen, I'm sensing that there's a lot of
emotion around this. No, I think I just prefer spooning.

(01:30):
I think I just felt like the sound of cuddling.
You know, it's similar to how a square is a rahombus,
but a rambus is not a square. You know, Spooning
can be cuddling, but cuddling doesn't necessarily equate to spoon
and spooning doesn't sound quite as much like the word curdling.
So I think that's I think that's what's going on

(01:51):
in my brain. You're also right there, yes, because when
I think of cuddling, I automatically think of like cottage
cheese cuddling. I think of care bears. I don't know why.
I literally like, I've never had what I just said
to you out loud. I've never had that concrete thought,
but I was like cuddling, Yeah, I just I think
of the care bears on their little clouds. That's what

(02:14):
I think of. We are really unpacking some deep stuff
already in this Why am I paying for therapy cottage cheese,
care bears? This is incredible? Um, But thinking though about
all these variations of cuddling, snugging, snugging, snugg e ng
when you put on a snuggie then you cuddle someone,

(02:35):
or snuggling as most people call it um. Then there's spooning,
all these you know, this kind of intimate close contact
that might seem like frivolous behavior to explore, but there
really is a lot of gendered hang ups with it.
There's a lot of evolutionary theory behind cuddling um. There

(02:55):
are lots of social rules around cuddling and new developments
in the world of cuddling today. Can't wait, Yeah, I
can't wait to get into the there there's a lot.
I mean, whether you listeners, whether you are pro cuddling
or anti cuddling, there's something in here for everyone. What
a divide, I know, I hope this is not too

(03:16):
controversial for people. Well, it's it's related to the are
you a hugger or not question? Because some people not
so much huggers, other people all about the hug, always
going to go straight in for the hug. Sure, And
I do find that that relates to the larger personality.
I mean, if I don't consider myself a hugger, but

(03:37):
there are people that I enjoy hugging, saying with cuddling.
I never really considered myself much of a cuddler, and
still until I started dating boyfriend dog. Yeah. I consider
myself a hearty handshaker. We'll see. I'm anxious all the
time and my palms get sweaty. I hate handshaking. Yeah,
I mean, I don't mind a good hug every now
and then. Um, but you mentioned your boyfriend dog when

(04:00):
I asked my fiancee about cuddling, because of course I
needed to get the guy's perspective on the topic, because
there's a whole stereotyping of men don't like to cuddle,
cuddle something. Cuddling is something that only only chicks like
to do, and that in no way is an impression
of my fiance But I asked him whether he liked

(04:21):
cuddling or not because we we sleep real close, and
he said I was the first person he had ever
been down to cuddle. Interesting, I know, And I was
walking on air for like two days. But I hate it. No,
I love it. I love it. And the next day

(04:43):
I was in a really good mood and he was like,
this is because I told you about the cuddling thing,
isn't it. I was like, maybe a little bit. Yeah,
Well it's interesting to see, and I mean, well, we'll
definitely get into all that hard hitting cuddling research in
a minute, but very hard hitting. But it is interesting
to think about it from a personal perspective and and
pat relationships and current relationships about how, yeah, it does

(05:03):
seem to be related to your larger personality, for instance,
whether you're a hugger and in what circumstances, but also
your attachment style. There's all this research into whether you
are UM an anxiously attached person or a securely attached
person or avoidant attachment and whether that means you will
cuddle or not. So in terms of the psychology of

(05:26):
cuddling in these attachment styles, we can look at it
not just in romantic context but also like platonic and
familial context as well, because probably the very first cuddling
that we experience is when we're little babies, being being
cuddled and snuggled all over the time. UM and there

(05:47):
has been a lot of research on childhood development and
cuddling and how it might influence attachment styles and also
um outcomes for kids and and and a piece on cuddling,
a very end up piece on cuddling and Slate written
by David Merritt John's UM. He looks into the history

(06:09):
of our cultural attitudes towards that parent child cuddling. Yeah,
and so in the early twentieth century, uh, cuddling was
thought to be a negative in in the family context.
You you might be making your children too soft or
too dependent on you. Um, which of course made me,
I say, of course, like you guys know what the

(06:31):
heck I'm talking about. But it made me think of
my grandmother. Of course, my grandmother. Of course it made
me think of her too. I know. Well, my dad's
mom was a very cold woman. And so according to
family legend, I say that like nobody my family ever
met her was her mother. And it was said that
my great grandmother never hugged were cuddled up to my

(06:55):
grandmother because she herself had had sort of a traumatic upbringing.
Her mother died at a very young age. Her stepmother
like basically didn't like her. Um. So it is like
interesting to see that sort of cultural sadness and unfortunateness
passed down. Luckily, my dad was snugly with me so well,

(07:16):
and a lot of moms back in the day were
advised not to cuddle, especially during the progressive era around
the turn of the century, you have the rise of
what's called scientific Mothering and uh David Merritt John's sites.
This landmark text The Care and Feeding of Children by
pediatrician named Luther Emmett Holt, and it was super popular,

(07:40):
to the point that the US Labor Department actually recruited
doctor Holt to write a mass produced pamphlet on proper
child rearing, which was a pamphlet ess a pamphlet back
in the days when pamphlets were were cool. Well that's
all there is to parenting. It's like a pamphlet worth Yeah, really,
that's all you need. Um. So it was unfortunate though,
that Holt was tasked to right in these pamphlets because

(08:02):
he was decidedly anti cuddling, and it was kind of
the um conflating cuddling with coddling um. And and this
even extended to rocking a baby, Wholet wrote by no
means should you do that. It's a habit easily acquired
in a very useless and sometimes injurious one. Yeah, my

(08:24):
parents rocked me for a long time. So I got
home on the weekend and I just we hopped in
that rocker and I just I just rock off to sleep.
That sounds like a real healthy attachment there, Caroline, not
not too close nothing, nothing is weird about that. Um.
And then in parenting takes a psychological turn with the

(08:45):
publishing of Dr John Watson's Behavior is a manual psychological
care of infant and child. And I mean he sounds
like a great, great guy that you'd really want to
invite over to your child's birthday party. He wrote, treat
them your children as though they were young adults. Never
hug and kiss them, never let them sit in your lap.

(09:05):
If you must, kiss them once on the forehead when
they say good night, shake hands with them in the morning.
SEVERI half a very business appropriate relationship with your children.
Since I don't have any kids and only have a
very old Labrador retriever, I'm just imagining doing doing them
that to Buddy, just kiss him on the forehead and

(09:27):
shaking a little Paul before late in the morning. Does
he shake? Yeah you can shake. Yeah you can't, Caroline,
smart dog. You're a good dog. Mom. But then it's
in the World War two era when it seems like
cuddling starts to take on more gendered meanings in terms
of the stereotype that is alive and well today, of
assuming that guys aren't into cuddling, and that cuddling is

(09:50):
not a manly, masculine thing to do. Because, as we
talked about in our Mama's Boys podcast a while back,
this was the era of mom is um and along
with the popular psychologists of the day, there was this
idea that overmothering was ruining the nation's young men and

(10:13):
softening them and making them, you know, too attached to
their moms and the whole. I mean that extends to
representations on screen. You can see it in Psycho and
Norman Bates um so. And that's also there are lots
of undercurrents of homophobia, I think, because wasn't it in
like the nineteen twenties that we start to see the
rise of well, because it's in the wake of psychoanalysis

(10:36):
coming around all these fears of people who don't leave
their same sex tendencies behind. You know, Freud wrote about, oh, well,
everyone has an attraction to members of the same sex,
but then you leave it behind or lt you become
anal retentive. So it seems like this is also rising
with alongside fears of homosexuality. Yeah, and I would assume

(10:56):
that all of that embedded itself into our cultural views
of cuddling as well. Yeah. Well, in the nineteen fifties
we start to get more of a clue that maternal
nurture and presumably in with this cuddling is important because
we get psychologist Harry Harlow's famous baby monkey experiments at

(11:17):
the University of Wisconsin. And for those of you who
might not have taken like a psychology one oh one
class and read about this study, it is so heartbreaking.
Tell us about it, Caroline Well monkey babies. Um. So, basically,
he was seeking to find out the whole nature versus
nurture argument and whether adoption children who were adopted could

(11:40):
be happy, healthy, and successful just like children who were
biologically born to their families. Um. And so he takes
these infant monkeys away from their mothers and puts them
either with like a wire structure of a monkey kind
of the dispens of milk, or a milk less wire

(12:03):
structure that's covered with soft haterry cloth. And he found
that despite the fact that neither one was an actual
monkey or a mother, um, the monkeys who grew up
being able to cling, to cuddle with and rub on
the terry cloth monkey pseudo monkey developed more normally. Those

(12:24):
who were able to comfort themselves by going and kind
of cuddling with this terry cloth structure ended up being
a little more normally developed than the monkeys who grew
up with the wire structure, because they found that when
they did test later and either scared the monkeys or
stressed them out, the ones who grew up with the
terry cloth mother reacted in a more healthy way. They
might run to the terry cloth structure and kind of

(12:45):
cling to it and then be okay. They've helped adjust
themselves to the fear of the stress, whereas the ones
that grew up with the wire structure threw themselves down
on the floor, screamed, got in the fetal position, rocked
back and forth. And they said that it resembled the
way that children who are completely neglected or deprived from
a young age react to stress and fear. And it's

(13:08):
also similar to what they saw among a lot of
adults who had been locked away in um mental institutions
for years well. And they found too that if given
the choice, the monkeys would forego getting fed from the
wire hanger the dispensed milk and instead go get comfort
in contact from the terry cloth. Yeah, and he found

(13:28):
by following these monkeys for a while, following them down
the street, I don't know, by like curious George and
his friends. Right, by continuing to observe the monkeys, he
realized that no amount of later life cuddling affection whatever
could right the path of the monkeys who had grown
up with the wire structure. Well, and that need for

(13:52):
in eight need for cuddling in you know, the primate
species will come in later in the episode when we
talk about the science and evolutionary theories behind why we
do this kind of bizarre behavior of rubbing up on
each other. Oh, you're a joy to go to a
bar with, I guess, oh yes, oh yes. But if

(14:13):
we if we move from parent child cuddling, that familial cuddling,
to platonic, friendly, same sex cuddling and look at the
culture around that in our assumptions, we see that it
gets very gendered very fast too, because it used to
be more common when boys and girls were largely socialized separately.

(14:37):
This would have been kind of pre twentieth century. Boys
and girls kind of grew up in their own spheres,
and so friendships between boys and girls were what I
should say, like between boys and boys and girls and
girls would be very intimate. I mean to the point
of a lot of you know, physical contact and intimacy
that we think of today in terms of girl friendships,

(14:59):
but not so much with boys. Yeah, I mean, into
the early twentieth century, emotionally and physically expressive friendships between
men were super common, and guys would even share beds,
like the the story that jumps to mind is, of course,
Abraham Lincoln and Joshua Speed sharing a bed. And there's
all of these people today who look at that out
of context and they're like, oh, Lincoln must have been gay.

(15:21):
He was like gay. Oh my god, we're so afraid
of him. And it's like, well, okay, hey, there's nothing
to be afraid of. But b you've got to look
at it in the context of the time when it
was super common for men to share beds and then
for men to share room. So there might be a
bunch of guys sharing a room if they're traveling. Yeah,
and John Ibsen actually published a whole book of photographic

(15:43):
evidence of these physically intimate friendships between men called Picturing
men Um, And it's incredible to see this comfortable intimacy
without that that fear of being perceived as gay. It's this,
you know, I mean, it's homophobia free expressions of of

(16:03):
genuine love between dudes. And it's really sweet to seek
guys not just like with their arms around each other, um,
but really close, like legs entwined and having those formal
poses that you might see like family portraits, but two
men with like their arms resting on each other's thighs.
And it really, it doesn't seem sure. There was one

(16:24):
like Civil War air, a picture where a guy sitting
on his buddies lap posing for the camera, you know,
like you do, like you there's only one chair. What
are you supposed to do? But signaling that homophobia may
at long last be waning, and my goodness, we certainly
hope it is a viral study among forty British male

(16:45):
student athletes found thirty seven of them reported cuddling with
their bros, even describing the super chill way that they
deal with accidental erections. Let's say that the Big Spoon,
you know, they're like bros hang out binging on Netflix
on the couch, wants the Big Spoon and because of contact,

(17:06):
you know, he gets an erection, and they told the
researchers that they usually deal with it one of two ways,
where the little spoon is like, hey, might you know
get rid of your direction, or then the other guys
like I'm gonna go pop to the loop and then
they just you know, take care of it. I mean, Caroline.

(17:32):
And it might sound and listeners, I know that might
sound far fetch, but I am legitimately recounting what is
in this right qualitative study. It's a study, but and
it's a study that went viral. The thing is about
the study a very small sample, a study sample, but
also judging by the coverage that it got and a

(17:57):
lot of leaping to lots of conclusions about how, oh,
college boys cuddle each other all of the time. Um
is I don't know, to me a sign that we
we maybe aren't so far away from cuddling if we're
so amazed at the fact that, you know, um, athletic
jock kind of dudes can touch each other and it's fine.

(18:17):
I mean that we talked about this back in the
day in our Bromance episode, which I encourage you to
go listen to if this topic interest to you. Um,
because yeah, In that episode, which was a couple of
years ago, we talked about trend pieces looking at dudes, bros,
guys who were like, yeah, we cuddle, so what we're
just buds were friends and um for guys listening, I

(18:39):
don't want to imply that anytime you cuddle you automatically
get an erection. I'm just saying that was something that
was noted in that study. Right, sometimes it happens, Sometimes
it happened, wers whatever. But if we look at girlfriends
cuddling in this context of what are called romantic friendship,

(19:00):
they were and still are super common. I mean, as
I was reading about you know, girls cuddling their girl friends,
I immediately thought of Girls the show. I mean, there
are so many scenes of uh, Lena and her friends
being in bed together, taking baths together. It's very close
and physically intimate. Yeah, like all my two best girlfriends

(19:23):
in the world, if we're like on the couch or whatever,
we'll totally like throw our legs over each other whatever
without a thought. Like, but then it's the same thing
as as what we talked about at the top of
the podcast, with like hugging or you know, who do
you cuddle with, or who do you want to cuddle with?
There is that degree of like super closeness for me
that proceeds like I'm gonna throw my legs over your lap.

(19:44):
I mean, you're just gonna deal with it. Listen, You're
gonna swaddle me and rock me like a baby. You
want to be my bff. Yeah, I have weird weekends. Um,
but this was really interesting to see in h early
twentieth century, as homophobia starts creeping in and it is
it's interesting to see for girls and and female friendships.

(20:08):
How in the same way that homophobia started creeping into
guy friendships, a lot of it being fueled by the
rise of psychoanalysis, there was concern about physical intimacy between
girl friendships as well. Um. As marriages for love became

(20:29):
the norm, especially once we get into the nineteen hundreds,
and along with the idea of your spouse being a friend. Um,
there were warnings to parents that they should make sure
that their daughters aren't too physically friendly with their girlfriends
because that might lead to lesbianism because of our quote

(20:50):
unbridled libidos. Um. Yeah. William James uh was writing in
the eighteen seventies. I believe, And I was discussing how men,
you know, just have this natural aversion to wanting to
be attracted to their male peers. You know, it's inherent

(21:11):
in us, but it's disgusting, and so there's a natural
aversion to it, whereas you know, that natural aversion is
not as strong or as common in women because we're
also pretty, you know, we are, so it's so soft,
it's no good. But I just I think it's so
funny when you come back through history and you look

(21:33):
at particularly men's view of like women's relationships with or
without sexuality involved, but like there there are so many
anxieties that prop up around this time. Well, I mean,
and definitely the rules for expressiveness in men's friendships have

(21:53):
been far more rigid in modern times because I mean,
even even though yes, there was that that panic over
same sex attraction within girl friendships, still because of the
assumption that women are naturally more nurturing, um, cuddling and
those kinds of behaviors have still been accepted though, I mean,

(22:15):
you have you know, girls are probably likelier to have
sleepovers where we brush each other's hair and oh my god,
being in elementary school in the library for reading time,
and like having your best girlfriend just braid your hair,
or you give each other massages, give each other's nails.
I wish someone would come braid my hair now, it's
like the most soothing. Maybe that's a cure for insomnia.

(22:37):
That's probably weird. I don't think my boyfriend would braid
my hair. Have you asked? I haven't? You know? You
never know, not a topic I've broached. Well, speaking of
your boyfriend braiding your hair, Caroline, that's the perfect segue
to talking about opposite sex cuddling because it's always been
this fraud issue because of the sex factor and the

(23:00):
whole accidental for play factor. Yeah. So if you go
back to eighteenth century colonial America, which let me tell you,
was a laugh riot, which is real fun. Back then,
wintertime courtship might have involved this thing called bundling, which
to me, in my head, even though I know what
it is, I still just pictured two people in sleeping
bags bumping up against each other. It was kind of

(23:22):
like that. I know. It was basically trial cuddling for
people who were likely on the marriage track. So it's wintertime,
it's cold, you don't have central heat and air. God, forbid,
and so the guy would sleep over at the girl's
house in the same bed. And of course this was

(23:43):
more about body heat than lust per se, although I'm
sure that there was a lust undercurrent londer current londer,
current londer current. Um. And this was supposed to help
see if they were compatible for marriage, but to prevent
the sex from happening, they might sleep in this bifurcated

(24:03):
bundling sack, which again like do they make these at
camping stores? Can I get these? Yeah? At Yield? Are
I had the bifurcated bundling sack? Um, I'm sure, Like
with this artisan thing going on, I'm sure, like Etsy,
somebody makes bifurcated bundling. Do you want to bring back bundling? Yeah, bundler, Yeah,
it's our new Uh, it's our tender app competitor, right

(24:25):
and and like those apps, there's no e er, it's
just are of course bundle. Um. So they would be
in the sack and or have a bundling board between them,
and I'm like, wait, why are you having a board
if this is about body heat? Well, I bet Caroline,
the loundertones combined with the body heat would permeate the

(24:46):
bundling board, which listeners, A bundling board is exactly what
it sounds like. It's just it's just a board that
they put down the middle of the bed. Yeah, and
so I mean, at least in this way, if those
undertones do or take you, the family would at least
know what man was responsible for impregnating their daughter. Yeah,
I mean, because it's funny. So this was happening in

(25:08):
the context of premarital pregnancy being on the rise. So
this was kind of a way for parents to be like, listen,
I guess if it's going to happen, we need to
know who to marry a little susan off to, just
in case. The Puritans though, by the way, we're just
outraged by this whole bundling trend um. But as our

(25:31):
sexual mores have loosened up as we burned our bundling boards,
so to speak, much of our heteronormative romantic cuddling discourse
really revolves around two major assumptions, that men used cuddling
to initiate sex, and that women used cuddling to bond
after sex. Yeah, very divided these assumptions. Yeah, for us,

(25:55):
it's bonding, for them, it's just spreading their seed. Yeah,
and so we're gonna unravel the gendering of these cuttle
preferences when we come right back from a quick break.

(26:16):
So before we get into the cuddling battle of the
sexes in quotes, let's talk for a minute about why
this behavior permeates our closest relationships, because there is some
science to this. Yeah, I mean, basically, it promotes bonding.
You get the release of oxytocin, which is that bonding hormone,

(26:39):
and it basically communicates social information, including touch, to our
brains reward system. It's like it's like candy, like eating
a delicious chocolate bar. It would be like when when
your boyfriend dog braids your hair, your oxytocin would are
we are we in our bundling sack, in your bundling sack. Yes,

(27:00):
your oxytose in your brain would gather up boyfriend dog
hair braiding, the sense of calm, and then deliver that
to your brain's reward system and you'd be like, oh,
I really like that, right, and so then your stress
levels plummet as basically anyone who's had a good old
cuddle can attest that good old cuddle, good old cuddle,
little cuddle, puddle, good solid cuddle. So if we look

(27:23):
back for a minute at that parent child cuddling, we
start to see this, these neurological benefits playing out from
the very beginnings of our lives, because our brains really
are wired to enjoy this. Uh. There was a study
published in two thousand nine in Nature Neuroscience, for instance,

(27:43):
that located receptors in our skin that transmit pleasant touch
sensations not limited to cuddling. But in a way, they're
kind of like our cuddle receptors, being like, oh, I like,
I like how this feels. This is nice, I feel safe. Yeah,
my boyfriend has strong cuddle receptors. But we'll get into
that when we talk more about the gender division. But so,
speaking of people with strong cuddling receptors, there's this mom

(28:08):
from Amsterdam, and Kristen and I both posted this to
our social media because it was like kind of funny
but also horrifying. She knitted a full life size replica
of her son. She knitted a suit of her son
because she was like, he doesn't cuddle with me as

(28:28):
much anymore now that he's a teen or a tween
or whatever, and so you know, I wanted to hold
onto those cuddling days, so I knitted a suit of him. Yeah,
and it looks super creepy because he wears it like
it's hollow. It's not like she stuffed it with stuffing.
I mean, like her human son wears it. Okay, but
here's the thing, Um, I feel a little bad for
her because of course the story went viral and people

(28:51):
freaked out saying like, you're the creepiest mom on earth. Also,
how long did that take? But anyway, Uh, it was
a joke. She did it trying to be funny, but
of course some things were lost in translation and people
just saw cuddling son and that's kind of disturbing. Replica. Yeah,

(29:11):
bless her heart. It is a horrifying It's a horrifying creation.
And I totally dig the sense of humor though, But
if you really just literally do see the picture and
the quote about like I miss cuddling my son, because
I know when I posted it to our tumbler, people
were like, oh my god, this woman needs help. Yeah yeah,

(29:32):
but there is some science to do back up that desire,
her desire to cuddle her song, because I think that
is legit because when we did post it to the
Stuff I've Never Told You Facebook page. A few moms
commented saying, I know exactly what she's talking about, because
it's in our d n A. A two thousand six
study found quote a maternal predisposition toward touch significantly predicted

(29:59):
babies to receptivity, and another study found twins tend to
have comparable cuddle levels. So, I mean, it seems like
if you, if you are like this lady and you
really like to, you know, cuddle, and that's one of
your love languages, you might say, yeah, one of the
ways that you bond, then um, then yeah, maybe you

(30:21):
maybe you do knit a life size replica of your child. Sure, yeah,
if you're into that. I bet she's a hugger too.
But I thought it was interesting. In that Slate piece
when David Merritt John's was talking about the sex difference
between male and female babies cuddle receptivity, he says that
it's basically when he was speaking with temperament experts, but

(30:43):
he said it was basically the same no matter the
sex of the child. It's just that some babies, male
or female, aren't as down for super cuddling as others.
Some are total snuggle babies and others are like, well,
I'm gonna go stiff as the board, please put me down.
It's about fifteen or kind of like cats, you know,

(31:03):
trying to cuddle a cat and it's like, get me
out of here. Um and oh man, I love trying
to cuddle a cat because it's just sun shot somewhere down.
Before we came into the studio, I was just talking
to Hollway from History stuff about kitties and she was like,
because I told her how much I wanted a dog,
and she was like, well, you know, you should get
a cat. And I was like, well, if I could
guarantee that it would be a cuddly dog like cat,

(31:24):
I would totally get one. But you never know. Well, listeners,
if you know of any good dog like cats Caroline
could cuddle, let us know and please send pictures. Yeah,
I'll rent it, Like I mean, I can't have a
pet right now, but like, I'll absolutely rent it from
you rent a kitty. Um. So if we look though
at friendly cuddling, that same sex platonic cuddling that we
talked about a little while ago, scientists think that it

(31:48):
might be our primate version of grooming each other. So Caroline,
I'm not going to come up to you and like
dig through your hair and look for fleas or or
bugs or things like that. Than you're welcome as much
as I want to. Um, But they think that, you know,
our cuddling behavior is related to that. I mean, think

(32:09):
of how you know girlfriends will hold hands, will link arms.
We I mean I might brush your hair and then
and then secretly try to see if you have any
any face in your hair, so that you know to
bolt if you see one. Well, didn't. These researchers also
say that they thought that not only was the primate
you know, tick searching or flee searching and grooming a

(32:30):
precursor to our cuddling, but that it was also a
precursor to like gossip circles. It's a way to spend
time with people you love and care about in like
an intimate way. Um, and then you know, once we
actually gain the ability to talk and say human words, Uh,
then we're just talking smack about the cave women next

(32:50):
to us. I think about this too whenever, Um, I
groom my dog. Now, you guys tell each other secret? Yes,
he tells me all the secrets and I brush out
his old fur. You know, good way to spend time
together and gossip about the other dogs that your your
apartment complex is always talking smack about my fiance. Let
me just tell you home man. But when it comes

(33:12):
to romantic cuddling, the cuddling, that's that's the most controversial,
the most fraught with stereotypes. Evolutionary theory explains post quital
cuddling motivated by women wanting to make sure that the
dude who might have just impregnated her is going to

(33:33):
stick around and you gotta love some always had her
normative and predictable. Evolutionary theory because on the flip side,
they maintain that men might be more inclined to engage
in more hedonic activities like pleasure seeking activities like having
a smoke, eating or having sex again, rather than wanting

(33:55):
to cuddle, because guys are just about that, about that
pleasure center, all of at that base. Um. Which great,
that's gonna be in my head forever now. Um. But biologically,
researchers say cuddling off of boost sexual attraction because it's
linked to an increase in testosterone, which might also explain
how cuddling does double duty as both for play and

(34:18):
postcoital relaxing. And there was this study in the Archives
of Sexual Behavior that we looked at that discussed how
couples who partake in post sex cuddling felt more satisfied
with their sex lives but also their relationships in general.
And they found that it mattered. Cuddling mattered more than
the foreplay or the duration of the actual intercourse because

(34:42):
our brains look at it as a positive post sex reward,
and I can only imagine that no matter male or female,
if you do have this stronger like touch reward receptors,
that it's even better. But what's what I loved is
that they found that it's not just postcoital like feel
so rewarded, so fulfilled, I'm so happy with my partner,

(35:03):
but also the effect lasted for a long time, like months, Yeah,
I mean, and even isolated outside of sex, just cuddling
on its own, when you're laying on the couch and
bene watching Netflix. Yet again, it can be, you know,
a bonding activity for couples, not surprisingly, and there's research

(35:23):
to back it up. So I mean, it's just funny
in looking up research for this podcast, how the media
really love to make like sweeping generalizations about cuddling. Um
in terms of, oh, science finally proves that couples who
cuddle are better than everyone else, or science proves that

(35:45):
men love cuddling and women actually loath it. And we've
kind of concocted because of a lot of our sort
of misinterpretation of studies, um and and assumptions, Uh, that
there is this cuddling war going on in this battle
of the sexes, almost the most adorable war, the softest

(36:10):
care bears just hitting each other with pillows. Yeah, exactly,
because the assumption that most men don't like cuddling is
based far more on gender norms than hardwiring. All of
that neuroscience we've just been talking about. For instance, in
nineteen seventy six, scientists Mark Hollander at Vanderbilt studied gender

(36:31):
differences in cuddling. On the basis going into this study,
h Hollander assumed that quote, according to our prevailing viewpoint,
it's unmanly to want to be held or cuddled. Only
women are permitted or encouraged to express such feminine wishes. Yeah,
but when you look at statistics, which we so love

(36:52):
to do, there isn't really a huge difference. And how
much all dudes and all ladies like to cuddle, Yeah,
as much as a headline every other month will claim that, oh, yeah,
women really do love to cuddle. No, no, no no, wait,
it's actually guys who love to cuddle more than women. No,
it's it's kind of it's kind of breaks even, sort
of like the sex differences in babies, where it's like,

(37:13):
you know, we just have a subset where they're they're
just the cats, the cats of the world. They don't
want to be cuddled. Right. There was this twenty eleven
Kills the Institute study on older long term couples that
found a slightly stronger twelve versus nine relationship between cuddling
and kissing and relationship satisfaction among men. Of course, there's

(37:36):
all sorts of things you have to take into account,
including like who in this long term study has dropped
out due to divorce, Like maybe all you're left with
is the people who genuinely just love spending time to
get well and the chicken egg, two of which comes
first the relationship satisfaction or the cuddling and kissing behavior.
But the way that three percent edge was interpreted in

(37:59):
headlines across the internet was men love cuddling. They love
it way more than women, so much more than women.
And I feel like if you just ask humans about cuddling,
it's like what we've been saying the past couple of
minutes that it's literally like, yeah, you've got some people
who like it, and some people who don't, and some
people like me who really hated it and weren't really

(38:19):
down with it until they met their person. Yeah. Um,
but there is an interesting link to between cuddling and
attachment styles, so we talked about um earlier in the podcast.
A two thousand and fourteen study examining attachment style and
both cuddling among parent child relationships and romantic relationships did

(38:42):
find that women overall reported more positive feelings about cuddling,
but the researchers weren't entirely sure why. Well, here's the
thing I mean. So, as you mentioned at the top
of the podcast, you've got the spectrum of attachment styles,
everything from avoidant attachment, which is like, oh I love you,
but like I'm going to keep an arm out, uh,
to secure attachment, which is you're well adjusted, you like cuddling,

(39:05):
you're not going to spend twenty four hours a day
with your person, but you love them whatever, all the
way to the anxious attachment, which is fear of abandonment.
It's I've got to cuddle you because you might leave me,
Like I've got to cuddle you because it makes me
feel better. It's a self seething behavior. And as I
was reading this, I was like, oh, okay, Because although
my boyfriend and I are sort of each at the

(39:26):
middle of the spectrum in terms of attachment styles, I
would say that I am I don't I don't know,
left of center in terms of the avoidant attachment style,
and he's a little bit right of center in terms
of the anxious attachment style. Although we are obviously very
secure with each other and in love and all that
griss stuff. But I think that that sort of helps
encapsulate our individual relationship with cuddling, where I came into

(39:50):
being like, uh, and he just I mean that boy
wants to cuddle all the time. But a notable thing
about that study on attachment style and cuddling was that
of wutly attached people were not down to cuddle. They
found like there was a strong relationship between you know,
not being into it and being avoidantly attached, Whereas you
would assume that anxiously attached people would want to cuddle

(40:13):
all the time, but researchers um like, to their surprise,
did not find a relationship wasn't It was a much
weaker link between the anxiously attached style and cuddling. So
it could just be that my boyfriend just like likes
to cuddle. Just well, I mean, I wonder if that
speaks so to the universality of cuddling where I mean,

(40:35):
it is such a such a common behavior that it's
not really much of an outlier for someone to like
to to cuddle. Yeah. Sure, I mean I'm definitely a convert.
You know. Like my boyfriend had been um basically like
out of town for two weeks, and I went over
to his house last night and we just lay on
the couch just like silently just cuddled for a long time.

(40:57):
It was a way to reconnect. It's that it's that
sets in those good bonding chemicals. You gotta get that
oxytocin refilled sometimes. And you know what, I was the
big spoon. Yeah that's really sweet because your boyfriend is
super tall. I know, I just love cuddling up to that.
But but even in hookup context there isn't a huge

(41:20):
gender gap either. And I was thrilled to see this
studied because I feel like this is where the cuddling
stereotypes totally come out of UM anecdotally in conversations I've
had with my girlfriends about hookups. UM Binghamton Universities justin
Garcia UM did a survey and found that of dudes

(41:42):
and sixty one percent of women wanted to snuggle post
hook ups. So yeah, more women, but still a lot
of dudes. Meanwhile, in committed relationships, there was no difference
at all of all the people wanted to cuddle and
liked doing it. UM. So that said to me, like,

(42:02):
we are maybe making up some of these stereotypes. Obviously
there are some some differences, but they are narrower than
we probably assume or tend to read into. Well, it's
all of the crap about gender norms. It's almost like
we want to believe it. It's funny. It's like it's
funny to believe that a man who likes to cuddle

(42:25):
is feminine or weak or whatever, or like we're gonna
smother you, clingy. Yeah, all of that junk and that
you know a woman who doesn't like to cuddle, is
you know a tramp who's going to leave you. She's
so tough, tough, need to cuddle so independent. Um, in
straight long term couple of contexts, because ps, there is

(42:48):
zero research at least that we found on same sex snuggling,
so researchers up to it well same sex romantic relationships,
not same sex platonic friends specifically uh British college jocks. Um.
But in the straight long term couple contexts, cuddling is

(43:09):
mutually beneficial related to healthy, satisfied relationships, whether it's used
to initiate sex or not. And that's something Caroline, but
you talked about in that study where it's like whether
we're doing it before sex, after sex, are just on
a random evening when you haven't seen each other in
a long time. Culling can be good for you and
it makes a lot of sense because of the you know,

(43:30):
the physiological effects of it. Well, you mentioned that there's
little to no research among same sex romantic relationships uncuddling,
but this is also an area where we could use
more research for the a sexual community. You know, we've
we've got a lot of letters in recent months from
members of the a sexual and a romantic community who

(43:52):
you know, obviously want to hear themselves represented in media
and in research, and there's really nothing out there about
them either. Yeah, I mean, they have a lot of
kind of crowdsourced resources. And um, I looked in that
for thoughts on cuddling because there are people within you know,

(44:14):
the a sexuality spectrum who are totally down to snuggle
and really love snuggling and cuddling and spooning, but just
don't desire any sexual contact beyond that. And so there
are you know, lots of questions at that point of
for you know, for their partners, how do they you know,
make sure that that's not misleading in any kind of way, um,

(44:38):
and is it mutually satisfying? And so I would love
to hear from any a sexual or a romantic listeners
about the cuddling issue too. In a word about context
and you hinted it as Carolina a second ago when
you said that you are cuddling convert, because I mean,

(44:59):
I think how how much someone likes cuddling in the
moment when you ask them, like, do you enjoy cuddling?
Depends a lot on the circumstances around it. Are you tired,
is it super hot in the room. Are you not
really like into that person who's next to you? For
whatever reason? You know, sometimes you just want to sleep

(45:22):
on your stomach with a pillow over your head and
call it a day. Yes, I do. My name is Kristen. Yeah. No,
I Even within my relationship, there are obviously times that
I'm like, get away from me, especially when it's time
to sleep, Like I'm fine cuddling up before we go
to sleep, but when it's time for lights out, like,
get off me, don't touch me. Although of course it's

(45:43):
freezing in my boyfriend's house all the time. Sometimes we'll
do the thing and this is probably t m I,
but we'll like fall asleep kind of snuggled up because
we're freezing, and then wake up in the middle of
the night drench I know that feeling. Well, sorry for
grossing an one out, but I mean, if you don't
have a super cuddler like my boyfriend, which you better not, Uh,

(46:08):
there are other cuddling opportunities out there. Okay, Yes, this
brings us to the strangest wrinkle in this cuddle puddle
more people these days are cuddling with perfect strangers like Balki. Yes,
where people are cuddling Balkie. Um. And here's the thing.

(46:28):
While it scientifically makes sense that we crave pleasant touch
and its physiological effects, it does not make any socio
scientific sense to cuddle with a stranger because it kind
of violates so many norms. And uh is perplexing to
a lot of researchers because I mean, even even for me,

(46:51):
as someone who is um more of a non hugger
than a than a hugger, the idea of just meeting
someone in a park and laying down and then having
their you know, body odor and the hot breath so
close to me and not knowing them makes my skin
crawl because it just seems so it seems very unsafe

(47:12):
to me. Um. But there's an app for that. If
you are a cuddler and there are a lot of
colors out there, has someone already made bundler? No one's
made bundler. We can still make buddler, okay, okay, and
our bifurcated bundle bags trademarked Sminty of course. Yes. Um.
But there is an app formerly known as cuddler Uh,

(47:34):
it's called Spooner, and geo locates people around you who
are down for a cuddle. Yeah. This sounded like woe
danger zone to me because just you know, dating websites
can be sketched in general, or websites apps. I don't know,
I'm old. Hello, um anything in the outside world, things
that are outside of my comfort zone, I e. The

(47:56):
podcast studio Um. But Charlie will Hims, who's the founder
of Spooner, told Salon that I think is a culture
we're ready to consider. Cuddling is more than just something
that happens before after sex, but it's something worth pursuing
in its own right. Cuddling takes communication, respect for boundaries,
and self control, and he's telling them all about how like, no,

(48:16):
it's totally fine, it's totally safe. Like it helps you
and even in your personal life work on your communication
skills about what you want, what you don't want. And
this is not about sex. This is not meeting to
pick people up for sex. This is literally for cuddling.
And hey, if people like hit it off and one
a date after, like cool, that's fine. But I was
reading this like, there's no way that is so like

(48:39):
murder central in my brain and and I know a
lot of people out there are which just got really offended.
I'm I am sorry. That's just me personally being totally
afraid to cuddle with strangers. Yeah, yeah, you and I
have similar I think personal cuddle boundaries. Yeah, I mean
that sense. If I don't even like shaking hands and
you don't want a sweaty cuttle, I don't want to

(48:59):
go old body I have. When I was in high school, UM,
like a bunch of friends and I used to have
like we'd all be hanging out at night or whatever,
and we used to have, um, basically the congo line
equivalent of cuddling. There would be like fifteen or twenty
of us like lying down, just spooning. It was hysterical.
Maybe some alcohol was involved. It's a smelly cuddle, um

(49:25):
when I don't have her name in front of me.
But a writer over at Daily Dot tested out the
Spooner app, and one of her main complaints in terms
of safety was that you can't um select by gender.
So if you want a same sex cuddle because that
might make you feel safer, um, Spooner doesn't let you

(49:46):
do that. Because Williams thinks that you know it should
be because Williams thinks that it shouldn't be a sexual thing.
But in her experience, the people who are messaging her
were almost exclusively dudes who seem to want uh well,
who want a sexy times Hello. Have you been on

(50:07):
the internet? Yes, that is how those things are gonna work. Sorry,
Charlie Williams. And you're like utopian view of cuddling app
literally sorry Charlie. Yeah, yeah, I wonder though, if there
are any listeners who have tried spooner, please tell us
if it goes better then it seems like it might.
This is why the world needs Bundler, Kristen. We would

(50:27):
ensure that there was a gender selection, but would it
only be for proper courtship. I don't know. I haven't
thought that. We haven't we haven't developed our business plan yet. Um.
But if you want to cuddle in a safer context,
you can go to a cuddle party. Caudle parties exist
and they are organized by groups around the country, like
Minnesota's Nurture Yourself, Um, and you started in early two thousands,

(50:51):
and usually if you go to a cuddle party, it's
exactly what it sounds like. It's kind of like Carolines
high school experience, minus the booze. You're not allowed to
go drunk, um, but you wear pj's. A lot of
cuddle party rules asked that you don't eat garlic beforehand.
Smart are very smart, and I will give them this.
There are a lot of rules around constant Yeah. Yeah,

(51:13):
they make sure to set it up ahead of time
that you know, no means no respect everybody's boundaries, all
of that stuff, which is incredibly important in any context.
But I especially appreciated how Nurturing Yourself noted that crying
and giggling are encouraged at their cuddle parties. Um. And
it's exactly what it sounds like. I mean, you kind
of you start off with sort of a group orientation

(51:38):
and then gradually it evolves into a one giant cuddle puddle. Yeah,
and people are making money off of this. People are
there are professional cuddlers out there. And you know, we're
not talking about some Japanese trend that has probably been
misinterpreted in American media. We're talking about in the United States,
professional coddlers have opened up shop. And this was report

(52:00):
it on in the Wall Street Journal, which I especially
appreciate it. I love picturing my father picking up the
Wall Street Journal, which he gets in the mail in
reading an article about professional cuddlers. I imagine he just
clears his throat very and comfortably, puts the paper down
and makes a sandwich. But it's a serious business. These

(52:22):
professional cuddlers will charge clients for non sexual snuggles. Obviously,
the number one thing that these professionals have to combat
our perceptions that it is a form of prostitution, essentially
your sex work. Um. But business names include Cuddle Up
to Me, the Snuggery, and Cuddle Therapy. And I think

(52:42):
Cuddle Therapy was one of the original ones, open not
surprisingly in San Francisco. And I mean, obviously it is
easy to laugh and dismiss this kind of stuff, but
they also talked to a woman named Samantha Hess who
opened up Portland's Cuddle Up to Me, and she specializes
in cuddles for people who've sperienced trauma, people with autism,
and she says that she regularly sees people with disabilities

(53:05):
and disfigurements who just in a very human nature way,
just need that human contact. Yeah, I mean, in that way,
it's um, it makes sense. That these businesses exist in
that and that clients seek them out for for non
sexual purposes. Just I think it was it was her
talking about how, you know, a lot of these people
just want to feel special and loved for a moment um,

(53:29):
And she's actually developed an entire curriculum of various types
of cuddles that clients can come in and select. Um.
I think there are lots of elderly patients or clients
I should say as well, because they live in such isolation. Yeah,
human touch is so important, it is. I'm a total convert, Yeah,

(53:52):
due to professional cuddling. Uh, not for me personally, but
now I'm a I'm a convert since I started dating
my boyfriend to convert general cuddling. Well, now I'm curious
to know about our listeners. Are you into cuddling? Do
you have any thoughts about cuddling? Have you ever been
to a cuddle party? We want to know all of

(54:14):
your cuddling thoughts and guys, do you ever encounter those
bogus gender stereotypes if you're a dude who likes to cuddle?
Has it ever backfired on you? Mom? Stuff at house
stuff works dot Com is our mailing address. You can
also tweet us at mom Stuff podcasts or messages on Facebook,
and we've got a couple of messages to share with
you when we come right back from a quick break, Caroline,

(54:36):
I'm in the process of giving my personal site, Chris
and Conor dot com a makeover thanks to Squarespace, and
I can tell you firsthand that it is super easy
to use, intuitive and they have fantastic design aesthetics. So
my new site is going to look real nice. It's
just pictures of Beyonce though, right pretty much? Yeah, basically, um,

(54:59):
so we're regardless of what celebrity you put on your
personal website. We use square Space. It's going to look
professionally designed, regardless of skill level, and there's no coding required.
They've got intuitive and easy to use tools, and you
get a free domain if you sign up for a year.
But folks, that means that Kristin Conger dot com is taken,
so don't even dry. But to start your free trial today,

(55:23):
head on over to square space dot com. And when
you decided to sign up for square space, make sure
you use our offer code mom staff to get ten
percent off your first purchase square Space. You should and
now back to the show. I will let her here

(55:44):
from Michelle. In response to our episode on wrinkles, she says, Hello,
I've been listening for a long time, and I'm writing
in for the first time now. I just listen to
your episode on wrinkles and something you mentioned sounded exactly
like what I've been told in real life. You talked
about a study where older women are judged to look
angry and unapproachable because of their sagging skin. Those exact

(56:05):
same words, angry and unapproachable, were thrown at me in
a job evaluation a couple of years ago. I'm fairly
young and don't have wrinkles yet, but do have resting
bitch face. I'm already hyper conscious of what my face
is doing at all times now thanks to that evaluation,
and I am terrified now of what's going to happen
when I start getting wrinkles. Will I be judged to

(56:26):
be even angrier and more unapproachable than I am now?
Will I live alone forever with my cat because other
humans don't think I'm pleasant enough. The connection between resting
bitch face and wrinkles is one I hadn't made before.
Men are allowed to have normal resting faces and age
while women are not. At the same time, a male
coworker that had what I would call arresting angry face

(56:47):
and I were talking about our evaluations. I told him
that I was called angry. He said that he was
simply told to work on his communication skills. It's enough
to make my mood reflect what my face is apparently
already showing. Here's to hoping that society changes enough by
the time I start getting wrinkles to keep me from
being friendless forever. I know you've done a video on

(57:09):
resting bitch Face, but if you ever do a whole podcast,
I'll certainly be interested. Thank you for all the work
you do well. Thank you, Michelle, and I'm sorry about
your evaluation at work. That's a fantastic idea. We should
so do a resting bitch Face episode. Uh So, I've
got a letter here from Janice about our street Art

(57:30):
Sisterhood podcast, and she writes, while I'm not a street artist,
I am a professional visual artist. About three years ago,
I took a deep breath, scrapped the serving job I had,
and went into business for myself full time as an artist.
Since then, I've been really working to build my portfolio
and get into galleries and such here in the Austin
area while surviving off of commissions and a part time

(57:53):
job at a local arts store. Thanks for the Internet,
I'm now able to reach an audience that allows me
to actually do this. But it also gives me a
man to wear, and it sometimes gives me some interesting
insights into how artists are viewed. One such insight I've
blamed is that people almost always assume that I'm male.
I'm almost without fail referred to as a heat even
though my name is Janice and a lot of people

(58:15):
find me through my website. Here's a real insight though
for myself. I learned early on that the mask of
anonymity can actually help me get a better sale. I'm
not sure why, but when people find out I'm female,
they seem to want to haggle with the price more.
IM not sure if everyone else's experiences, but it seems
that people think the work of women is somehow diminished

(58:36):
versus the work of a male counterpart. I've only been
listening to your podcast for about a month, and I'm
so excited to have found you, and I listened to
you know all the time while I'm painting and creating.
Thank you so much for the really interesting topics and
a more female viewpoint. A lot of podcasts have resonated
with me a great deal and I'm excited to go
back through all of the interesting topics. So thank you, Janice,

(58:56):
and for other visual artists out there sending I'm curious
if you found a similar thing in terms of people
wanting to haggle more with you and talk your price
down once they find out that you are a leady creator.
Let us know, Mom sab at house. Stuff works dot
com is our email address and for links to all
of our social media as well as all of our blogs,

(59:16):
videos and podcasts with our sources. So you can learn
more about the science of cuddling. Head on over to
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