It Is A Glorious Day: Victims of Cute Aggression are Increasing. A Real Story.

I can remember as a child having an older person pinch your cheek, run their hand through your hair or even pat you on the back was pretty normal. Many members my generation have traumatic memories of being forced to hug or even kiss a very disgusting member of their family. We had an aunt who didn't have any teeth, and she wasn't shy about it. A very nice woman. It was a family tradition for all of us children to line up before leaving her home during the holidays and kiss her to say goodbye. I asked to be paddled rather than to endure this goodbye ritual. On an occasion, I experienced my aunt and the paddle. I never knew I was the victim of cute aggression. I just thought being forced to kiss a toothless old woman was part of the childhood experience. Now I know this type of thing actually has a name. It is known as cute aggression.

Below are excerpts from the story with my valuable insights in italics.

Cute aggression is characterized by an individual’s desire to squeeze, pinch, or even bite animals or humans without intent to harm. This behavior has been studied many times before, usually in the realm of behavioral psychology.

This makes me wonder if it also involves young puppies being forced to kiss older toothless dog relatives. So, if somebody squeezes, pinches or even bites me, but doesn't intend to harm me, is that considered cute aggression or some form of kinky behavior between consenting adults? It's good to know it has been studied many times.

“Do you want to study why some people are driven to suicide?”
“No.”

“Do you want to study depression, anxiety or phobias?”

“No?”

“What do you want to study?”

“I want to learn why a person may desire to pinch, squeeze or even bite a fellow human or an animal with no intent to harm them.”

“It's been studied so many times before.”

“What happened?”

“The researchers started pinching, squeezing and biting one another as well as animals with no intention to cause harm. Then something happened nobody expected.

“What?”

“The study quickly turned into kinky sex research.”

“Oh.”

The Yale researchers initially found that people reported feeling cute aggression more in response to baby animals versus adult animals,” explains Stavropoulos. “But even beyond that, people reported feeling cute aggression more in response to a picture of human babies that had been digitally enhanced to appear more infantile, and therefore ‘more cute,’ by enlarging features like their eyes, cheeks, and foreheads

Now, this is interesting. People went to a lab and were shown pictures of human and animal babies. These people then told about their feelings of cute aggression. This means they had a desire to pinch, squeeze or bite the baby animal and human babies but cause them no harm. I wonder how many toothless old women participated in this study? I can tell you from personal experience, they are some very cute aggressive individuals. People don't know the joy of being old, not cute and having nobody around you have a desire to bite, squeeze or pinch you. If they do, it is usually with the intent to cause harm.

Researchers recruited 54 participants between the ages of 18 and 40 for the study. The participants wore caps embedded with electrodes and were shown 32 photographs divided into four categories: Cute digitally enhanced babies, less-cute non-digitally enhanced babies, cute baby animals, and less-cute adult animals.

Who determines what is and what is not a cute human baby or animal? I would hate to be a participant in this study and see a picture of my kid in the less-cute non-digitally enhanced picture. I'm sure it would be the same way if you found a picture of your pet in the less-cute adult animals.

“Hey, I have a question.”

“What?”

“This picture of the less-cute non-digitally enhanced picture is my grandchild. I demand you put their picture in the cute baby category.”

“Sorry, I can't it.”

“Why?”

“You're looking at the pictures of the less-cute adult animals.”

“Watch it, one more crack like that and off comes the cap embedded with electrodes. Then it gets serious about here.”

“I'm glad you didn't discover your baby picture we put in the non-cute category.”

“What?”

“There was an especially a strong correlation between ratings of cute aggression experienced toward cute animals and the reward response in the brain toward cute animals,” says Stavropoulos. “This is an exciting finding, as it confirms our original hypothesis that the reward system is involved in people’s experiences of cute aggression.”

So people felt cute aggression toward a cute animal and their reward response was activated? If they were shown pictures of cute chickens or cute cows, the reward response may have been triggered because they were hungry. They may have wanted to see a cute cow between a bun with cheese and lettuce as well as some strips of a cute pig with it. This would make sense if they wanted to squeeze or pinch it. I think the biting in this situation couldn't cause the cute animal any more harm.

Our study seems to underscore the idea that cute aggression is the brain’s way of ‘bringing us back down’ by mediating our feelings of being overwhelmed.”