Too much, too little: preschool teachers’ perception of the boundaries of adequate touching

The study focuses on physical touch that is considered to go beyond what is perceived as ‘normal’. The researchers investigate how kindergarten teachers describe and explain situations where educators touch children too much or too little. The research question is: How do kindergarten teachers describe and explain situations where kindergarten teachers and other kindergarten staff touch children too much or too little?

Most of the situations described by the participants involved too much touching. Here, the informants talked about actions that were not part of the kindergarten’s duties, kindergarten teachers who did not set boundaries, and behaviour that resulted in inconvenience for children. It is indicated that such actions may be typical for inexperienced kindergarten teachers who have not yet mastered the emotional rules of work. On the other hand, such behaviour may be rooted in the fact that kindergarten teachers actively break these rules or are not familiar with them. In situations involving too little touch, the participants mainly referred to the kindergarten teacher and his/her fear of accusations regarding inappropriate behaviour or having a cold personality.

Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 30 qualified kindergarten teachers working in Swedish kindergartens. Out of the 30 kindergarten teachers, eleven were men and 19 were women, 20 of whom worked as kindergarten teachers, while ten worked as pre-school coordinators.

Hedlin, M., Åberg, M. & Johansson, C. (2019). “Too much, too little: preschool teachers’ perception of the boundaries of adequate touching”. Pedagogy, Culture & Society, 27(3):485-502.