Why you can't tickle yourself

[Netti-Netti]

The answer lies at the back of the brain in an area called the cerebellum, which is involved in monitoring movements. Our studies at University College London have shown that the cerebellum can predict sensations when your own movement causes them but not when someone else does. When you try to tickle yourself, the cerebellum predicts the sensation and this prediction is used to cancel the response of other brain areas to the tickle.

Two brain regions are involved in processing how tickling feels. The somatosensory cortex processes touch and the anterior cingulate cortex processes pleasant information. We found that both these regions are less active during self-tickling than they are during tickling performed by someone else, which helps to explains why it doesn't feel tickly and pleasant when you tickle yourself. Further studies using robots showed that the presence of a small delay between your own movement and the resulting tickle can make the sensation feel tickly. Indeed, the longer the delay, the more tickly it feels. So it might be possible to tickle yourself, if you are willing to invest in a couple of robots!
​

~Sarah-Jayne Blakemore, research fellow
Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, University College, London

From Scientific American, January 29, 2007
Sorry for the copy and paste.

 

[nativeastral]

ohno l hate being tickled, am l abnormal?!

 

[citizenzen]

 

[wil]

guess my cerebelum is broken...while I can't tickle myself in the ribs, I can't thoroughly scrub the bottom of my feet becuase it tickles so much I'd fall down in the shower...

 

[17th Angel]

Speak for yourself, I can tickle myself... Blakemore, epic fail.

 

[citizenzen]

If it's so hard to tickle yourself, why is it so easy for people to laugh at their own jokes?

 

[Faithfulservant]

tickling makes me violent

 

[juantoo3]

test tickle

 

[nativeastral]

aaaaarrrrgggghhhhh

 

[17th Angel]

tickling makes me violent

*silently offers you a card with the contact details of Ticklers Anonymous.*

 

[Postmaster]

lol.........

 

[Dream]

Wow. So maybe the feet are more ticklish because it takes longer for feet signals to reach your brains. It does take slightly longer. Maybe taller people have more ticklish feet?

 

[greymare]

lol,its true about feet..(very ticklish)..
And some people as they get older think that they arent ticklish anymore.... i beg to differ... sometimes you just have to find the right spot...... you may not get a giggle but you will get a result of some description. (lol)

 

[Faithfulservant]

i hate being tickled I punch my husband when he does it. why does he keep doing it. it doesnt feel good.. it hurts. and im REALLY ticklish.

 

[wil]

i hate being tickled I punch my husband when he does it. why does he keep doing it. it doesnt feel good.. it hurts. and im REALLY ticklish.

Namaste FS,

Then why did you do it? Your post just tickled me!

I'm so sorry, but I am chuckling. You've laid out the whole picture in my head, Dor tickling, you punching and getting mad.

Now does it always hurt, or only when someone goes to far? I remember getting tickled to soreness as a kid...but in general it tickles, it irritates, but it makes me laugh.

Now my daughter is so ticklish she would laugh with air tickles. Fingers just gettng close to tickle spots. I'm thinking if I tried this with you the reaction wouldn't be an air punch.

I found another that was so easy with air tickles that I developed the tickle grenade. All I had to do was smile at her, mime pulling pin and tossing the imaginary grenade at her feet and she would begin to laugh. She's got it so bad that her friends caught on and now they toss them. She is now in a position where she has to speak in front of her peers... It has been awfully hard for me not to sit the front row and toss a tickle grenade.

 

[Faithfulservant]

yes... air tickles DO tickle and It makes me laugh but the tickle laugh isnt a funny laugh its an -- im going to kill you if you dont stop-- laugh. whats worse is when he gets my 6 yo son to tickle me... I think thats cheating.

 

[Saltmeister]

tickling makes me violent

I wanna kill someone. I need a hitman, and maybe a hitwoman. I know! I'll tickle you, so that you, the hitwoman will get violent and hit and kill the person I hate.

The good thing is, I won't get arrested. I will be in a galaxy far, far away from the scene of the crime.

She is now in a position where she has to speak in front of her peers... It has been awfully hard for me not to sit the front row and toss a tickle grenade.

Wow. I wonder how it is for actors and actresses.

Just a suggestion of what they find funny makes them crack up, especially past fragments of a failed recording that they screwed up.

Cut! Take one, take two, take three . . .

Simply irresistible.

 

[shawn]

That would explain why a massage by someone other than oneself feels so much better.