An insightful article on biting, hitting and bullying by our own occupational therapist, Elrie Maree

Babies as well as adults all gain comfort and self-regulate through oral activities such as sucking on a pacifier or on candy. Biting builds strong jaw muscles, it provides neck and thoracic stability and it is used for organizing and grounding the body. Parents expect a baby to chew and bite on things, but if the older child still bites on things or people one should recognize his possible sensory reaction or behaviour and provide him with acceptable items to bite and chew on. One of the most basic demands of our daily existence is to process the sensory information from our enviroment in such a way that the body can respond to it in a relaxed and joyful way. Learning or survival is therefor the ability of the central nervous system to integrate the information from our senses so that the body can respond in an appropriate way on a physical as well as on an emotional level. Our sensory system consist of touch, smell, taste, hearing, vision, vestibular and proprioceptive input.

Read more: Biting (pdf 175 kb)