Fawning over cute babies isn’t just maternal — it’s science

<p>My wife Becky cannot pass an infant without going all goo-goo eyes over the child. “He/she is so cute!” She gushes with a stretched out linger on the vowel: “Kyooot.”</p><p>To her all babies are cute. Most women, I have unscientifically observed over my lifetime, seem to feel and react in much the same way. And now, according to an article I read recently, it appears I have science to back me up on this.</p><p>“Survival of the Cutest: How Puppies Manipulate Us” by Sarah Elizabeth Adler is in the November issue of The Atlantic. She cites research done at the Arizona State University canine-science laboratory which shows that cuteness in puppies peaks at between six and eight weeks of age. After that puppy cuteness drops off. This peak cuteness occurs just as the mother stops nursing her whelps. This is a crucial time because it is at this point that puppies begin to need humans to survive.</p><p>Although the article doesn’t go into detail, apparently the human-dog connection is so ancient that through eons of cultural evolution most puppies need human intervention to continue to live and grow. (And when I say “most,” I mean statistics which show up to 95 percent of puppies without human help don’t survive.) Whether by coincidence or by design, it is amazing that humans find puppies most cute when they most need us.</p><p>In addition, as dogs age into the relationship with their humans, they learn to raise their eyebrows and stick out their tongues, puppy-like, when humans are looking at them. This action releases Oxytocin, sometimes called the “love hormone” into both dogs and humans. Oxytocin is important in facilitating and strengthening bonds between babies and adults. You might say cuteness is part of what holds families together.</p><p>Of course, cuteness in the emotional, personal sense is a subjective feeling. Cuteness is in the eye of the beholder. But the concept of cuteness in a scientific sense, as a survival strategy, is not new. In the 1940s zoologist and ethologist Konrad Lorenz who later was awarded the Nobel Prize for his work in such matters, proposed that babies possess a set of facial and body features that elicit the desire and motivation in others to care for and nurture them.</p><p>These “juvenile features” can be observed in many young animals including humans. Such baby-like aspects include large eyes, higher foreheads, proportionately smaller noses and shorter limbs. These features are observed not only in animals and humans but on animated characters, as well. Evolutionary biologist Stephen Jay Gould noted that Mickey Mouse has changed during the years to become more baby-like, safer and more cute. A quick look at Saturday morning cartoon shows prove the strategy of cuteness is well understood by animators.</p><p>Another finding of the research is how cuteness develops over time. The evidence shows that, as one researcher said, “One is not born cute; one becomes cute.” People, it seems, tend to find newborns, puppies as well as humans, less cute than slightly older infants. In one study focusing on humans, six-month-old babies were seen as “significantly cuter than newborns.” (Of course, you probably wouldn’t want to share this data with any mother of a newborn.)</p><p>The researchers theorize that a delayed appearance of cuteness allows for social interactions such as playing and baby-talking to develop. They point out such developmentally imperative actions are not very effective with the extremely young. I suppose they are saying play is designed to begin when babies are cuter.</p><p>I’m sure Becky agrees with most of this research with the possible exception of the part about a newborn being less attractive than a six-month-old infant. To her all babies are equally Kyooot.</p>