Sometimes, a child may face problems or difficulties that upset them. As a parent, your position is delicate, and your approach must be thoughtful to avoid making them feel more uncomfortable. Often, words aren’t necessary, and a comforting gesture can be more effective. Your child will speak up when they are ready.

To better understand this concept, it’s important to note that humans subconsciously connect physical warmth with emotional warmth. This connection is especially significant in the parent-child relationship and develops from infancy. For example, a baby learns to associate the warmth of a hug with feelings of safety and care.

Therefore, in many situations, it’s not necessary to express with words that you understand or are there for your child. Instead, you can show them in subtle, comforting ways without making them feel pressured.

Next time you need to reassure your child, try one of these simple actions based on the psychology of “social thermoregulation.”

• Turn up the thermostat: A warm temperature makes children feel closer to the people they are with. In fact, a Dutch study gave children aged 4 to 6 a pile of colorful stickers and told them they could share some with a friend. The children in a warm room were more willing to share their stickers than those in a cooler room.

• Serve soup or hot chocolate: “Logically, it doesn’t make sense that drinking or holding something warm could influence our behavior, yet there’s a strong connection between the body and mind that plays out in all these different ways,” says Dr. Bargh. He and others have conducted studies where half of the participants were first asked to hold something warm, like a hot cup of coffee, and the other half held something cold. The participants had no idea that this was part of the study. They were then given various tests to measure how they felt about the participants and other people. In each study, those who had initially held a warm coffee were more likely to have “warm” feelings toward others than those who had held an iced coffee.

• Cuddle your child, wrap them in a blanket, or give them a heating pad: Neuroscientists have discovered that a part of the brain called the “insula” activates in response to both types of warmth: when a person touches a heating pad or when they communicate with family and friends. Additionally, Dr. Bargh and his colleagues found that a different part of this brain area activates when a person holds something cold, is treated coldly, or feels betrayed.
• Keep these “techniques” to yourself: It’s important that your child doesn’t know about these methods because, according to Dr. Bargh, if they are aware, the natural effects are less likely to occur. If you tell your child that warming them up will make them feel better after a bad day, they might resist, making this approach ineffective. Instead, just give them a hug and tell them you love them and missed them, without any further explanation.