What if our attachment to soft toys could raise awareness about the protection of animal species?

Have you ever wondered why we tend to fall for the plush version of animals that we would never like to come face to face with? The most edifying example is undoubtedly that of the bear, transformed into a reassuring figure full of tenderness by our Western societies for decades. But what does our universal weakness for these “teddy bears” translate? This is the question posed by a very serious study carried out by French researchers. Recently published in The Journal of Positive Psychologythe research was carried out in 2019 in 13 French cities, with a panel made up of a thousand participants aged 3 to 72.

Collaborative, the experience was based on hundreds of teddy bears directly brought by the participants. The latter filled out a questionnaire aimed at informing the precise characteristics of their plush (softness to the touch, ease of handling, etc.). The volunteers were then asked to compare the comforting power of their “doudou” with eight other “teddy bears”. The operation was then repeated several times in a row, then repeated with another bear “stranger” to the participants.

Comfort at all ages

First conclusion of this research: the emotional connection plays a much more important role in reassurance than any other characteristic. “The teddy bear is a so-called transitional object, it brings comfort and security by replacing attachment figures, and thus makes it possible to better manage the stress linked to separation.“, explain the researchers. They add that the results of the study are independent of the age of the participants, which “recalls the teddy bear’s ability to bring comfort to all ages of life“.

“This work opens up promising avenues for studying the psychological functioning of individuals thanks to teddy bears, but above all, it suggests a form of predictability of their comforting power which could make it possible to expand the list of uses, for example, to school, in the hospital, at work, during negotiations or in a crisis situation“, estimates Thierry Brassac, scientific mediator at the University of Montpellier and co-author of the study.

Raising awareness of the decline of biodiversity through soft toys

But our attachment to stuffed animals can also say a lot about the representation we have of animals. “The question of the relationship to the living through the plush is not trivial, it raises many questions and discussions on psychology and the relationship to nature and to the living.“, explains to GoodPlanet Mag, researcher Anne-Sophie Tribot, who led the study. The latter underlines the important role of stuffed animals in connecting children to nature and suggests extending the range of toys and stuffed animals to a much wider spectrum than the “traditional” bears, tigers or lions. For example, by focusing more on birds, fish or insects.

A bias that has also seized several organizations campaigning for the defense of the environment. In 2017, the NGO Sea Shepherd launched its collection of stuffed animals inspired by marine fauna “Pollutoys”. “Sea comforters” certainly cute, but whose abdomen is filled with waste left on the beaches by humans and ingested voluntarily by these animals…

A few years later, the young French start-up Les Peluches de Marius launched an adorable eponymous collection inspired by grouper, a species of fish particularly appreciated by scuba divers and threatened by overfishing. The stuffed animals are designed in France then assembled in Portugal and part of the company’s sales (10%) is donated to the Tara Océan association, which fights against microplastic pollution of the oceans.