Just watching cute animals can make you better
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Editor’s note: There are more and more pictures of cute animals on the Internet. Many people just enjoy watching these photos to get inner pleasure and make the brain easy. This article was translated from the original article entitled “Looking at Cute Animals Online Is Literally Good for Your Brain” in medium.com.
On my social media, there are always some shocking news coming out endlessly. As I write this article, these messages are constantly presented to me: for example, a publication that everyone likes is being attacked by publishers, the fire is burning my hometown, and the society is in a terrible mess. Medium… If circumstances permit, I can leave my computer and leave all the pain behind me, at least, for a while I can be safe. But in other cases, when I had to work on a computer, I always went to Instagram to relax, because I created a lovely, joyful pet paradise where I could calm down in an instant.
This may seem like a nonsense solution, but it is not. Studies have shown that looking at cute things, whether they are babies, animals, or even inanimate objects, can alleviate stress, increase productivity, and even improve marriage.
Our love for cute animals can usually be explained by the “baby pattern”, a concept put forward by the Austrian animal behaviorist Konrad Lorenz. Infant schema theory believes that humans are attracted to creatures with big heads, big eyes, round faces, fat cheeks and big foreheads during evolution because they have to take care of their babies. The fun that early humans gained from observing babies made them want to take care of and protect them. We still have this tendency today. Our appeal to baby traits can be extended to include animals – especially small animals, which, like human babies, usually have large heads and facial features.
Pennsylvania State University (Penn StatEssence Associate Professor Jessica Gall Myrick studied how animals on the web affect our emotions.
She said: “Watching pictures or videos of cute animals may give people a similar feeling, because our brains are not good at distinguishing between intermediate scenes and real scenes.” “I studied people’s reactions to cat videos, in the video. They are all very cute cats, and it turns out that people are more active and energetic after watching these videos, and the negative emotions are correspondingly reduced.”
Merrick’s 2015 study is one of the few studies in this area that investigates people’s reactions to cute animals’ photos or videos. The study asked 7,000 people to see the cat’s photos or videos on the Internet before and after, and found that not only the cat’s photos can improve the participants’ emotions, but the more they look, the better. Research speculates that when people relate these images to positive feelings, they learn to expect these positive feelings from the same activities in the future, so the significance of viewing these photos is even more profound. However, the study pointed out that the people who participated in the study were most likely those who were already passionate about animals, so the results of this study were not so credible. In addition, 88% of the participants are women, and their response to cute things is usually more positive than that of men, so it is difficult to promote the results from a wider range. A study in 2018 found that after all participants watched the same picture of cute animals, women’s appetite for meat decreased more than men. One explanation may be that women tend to assume the role of caregiver and are therefore more susceptible to baby patterns.
Hiroshi Nittono, director of the cognitive psychophysiology laboratory at Osaka University in Japan, conducted several studies on “cute”. He said that the happiness brought by watching cute photos has two effects: one is to let us out of the “boring or nervous” life state, and the other is “Let us think of the warm, gentle feeling, this is our big Most people lack it. “The two are equally important: “For example, a pornographic site meets the first condition, but does not meet the second condition,” he explained. “Reading some touching stories or watching some touching stories will make us feel warm, but it may take some time to get rid of the boring or stressful life in an instant.” So, look at the cute animal pictures. Or video is a good and convenient way to get out of the stressful state of life and feel warm.
Looking at the photos of animals is even good for relationships between people. A study in 2017 found that when lovers watch photos of cute animals together, they canFeel the positive feelings these animals bring to their partners. Researchers were commissioned by the Department of Defense to conduct this study to help couples separated by deployment tasks.
Although I support the proliferation of animal content on all social media platforms (the animal module on reddit is really my source of happiness), I found that if my Instagram only has those “cute fans”, this social platform It can be a safe haven for me. When I am depressed, I can confide there to see some cute little animals. But there are a lot of non-animal content on Instagram that makes users feel bad. A 2017 study found that Instagram is the most emotionally harmful on all platforms, in part because on this platform, people usually only show their own packaging. The perfect side. So if you can convert it into a small corner of the “baby pattern”, if there is only that cute content on the top, the platform will get better and better. In addition, because Instagram has little to do with most people’s career development, journalism education, family connections and conversations, if Instagram users subscribe to pictures of Welsh dogs and take care of them or block those who make them feel bad – those so-called The perfect friend and industry scream, there will be no loss to the user.
Das is a Twitter user. He dressed himself as an anthropomorphic little panda and forwards cute little animals every day. He really feels that these forwardings have worked.
“The dog is the only good thing on the Internet,” he said. “I think that people’s happiness in sharing their puppies on Twitter is a real joy from the heart. There are too many questions on Twitter, people have too many different opinions, but if you share your little with me Dog, then we are friends.”
I personally like Shiba Inu, which is why I paid attention to @minapple, @hinaosora, @tommyrts and other accounts of at least ten Shiba Inu.
Friends who like cats may be attracted to @cooperthehimmie, @therealpercythehi’s tweets, or by the cocktail styles of the two cats of Amaro and Morty on @coqtale.
For those who like to record their cute animals, I can’t recommend @vincentjmusi anymore – he was a photographer for National Geographic magazine and now focuses on shooting expressive pet portraits.
So don’t follow those glamorous, wealthy human elites, and don’t take care of those friends who often feel cold or lonely at the party. Go and see the animals you like and you will be happy soon.
Translator: Xiaozhuo