Study Shows How Very Young Kids Are Drawn to Very Cute Things
My uncle has a cat. His name is Moe. He’s the brown one in the picture above, chilling out with his sister Mally. Moe is, fortunately for Moe, considered very cute by adults. This means my uncle feeds him and pets him and treats him sort of like a small hairy child. Moe is also, unfortunately for Moe, considered very cute by children. This means that children grab Moe and tug at him until Moe gets frustrated and runs away. It has always seemed obvious to parents and others that watch young children that they respond to cuteness, even if it is only in a very Lennie from Of Mice and Men way. But new research has shown just how deep and early this cuteness response really is. A recently released study found that even children as young as three were able to recognize what’s known as the “baby-schema,” a set of infantile features, across different species. The research was conducted by PhD student Marta Borgi and Professor Kerstin Meints,