ERC award for public engagement on human touch and ticklishness
Konstantina Kilteni, researcher at Karolinska Institutet, has received a 2026 European Research Council (ERC) Public Engagement with Research Award. The award recognises her work in engaging the public with research on touch and ticklishness, and how everyday sensory experiences can provide insights into how the brain works.
Konstantina Kilteni was awarded for what the ERC described as “transforming a universal and seemingly trivial experience into serious scientific insights through dialogue and laughter”.
Her initiative explores human ticklishness from a neuroscience perspective and addresses questions such as why humans are ticklish and why people cannot tickle themselves. Through museum-based public engagement activities, the project uses a familiar everyday experience to discuss how the brain predicts, processes and interprets touch.
Bringing science closer to people
For Konstantina Kilteni, the award highlights the value of engaging with people outside the research community.
“Receiving this award is a great recognition of the importance of bringing science closer to people. For me, public engagement is not only about explaining what we do in the lab; it is a two-way exchange,” says Konstantina Kilteni, assistant professor at the Department of Neuroscience at Karolinska Institutet and the Donders Institute, Radboud University, The Netherlands.
“Touch is part of everyone's everyday life, and when I talk about my research, people often start reflecting on their own experiences of touch and sharing their stories from childhood to adulthood”, she continues.
According to her, these conversations can also contribute to science by raising questions that researchers may not otherwise have considered.
What are your future plans?
“I would like to continue exploring the connection between scientific research and people's everyday experiences. There is still so much we do not understand about how the nervous system shapes the way we experience our own body and our interactions with the world,” says Konstantina Kilteni.
“I hope to keep creating opportunities where people can not only learn about our research but also share their experiences and questions with us.”
The eight award winners will present lessons from their public engagement work during the European Research and Innovation Days in Brussels in November.
About the awards
The ERC Public Engagement with Research Awards recognise ERC-funded researchers who engage audiences beyond academia and encourage dialogue between science and society. In 2026, an independent jury selected eight laureates from 110 applications submitted from 26 countries. Each winner receives a prize of €10,000.