How Supernormal Stimuli Turn Jiggly Buses into Baby Magnets

Picture this: a jiggly yellow bus carrying children, their parents, and even some animals through an amusing town. Inside the bus, one baby has a strand of yellow hair that swirls like an ice cream top, another has two wildly uneven pigtails, and a third is slaying a pair of goggles larger than his own head. Outside, the clouds look like blobs of whipped cream, and the homes resemble Christmas gingerbread houses. Everyone - kids, adults, and animals alike - is singing and dancing their way through this ride.

No, this isn’t a bizarre dream; it’s from the “Wheels on the Bus” video on Cocomelon’s YouTube channel. And this is precisely what my 6-month-old nephew is hooked to. But with more than 7 billion views, it is rather difficult to put all the blame on him. It seems the entire world has vibed to it at some point (I know I did).

But why are children, and even some adults, drawn to such colourful, melodic, overstimulating content? The answer lies in the fascinating realm of ethology, specifically in the concept of supernormal stimuli.

The idea of supernormal stimuli was introduced by Nobel laureate Niko Tinbergen, who discovered that an artificial sign stimulus may, at times, elicit a more intense response than any natural stimulus. Tinbergen observed that birds, for example, preferred a large, colourful, fake egg over their own real ones (talk about parental neglect). This is particularly why a songbird might incubate a bright blue egg with black polka dots instead of its own pale blue egg with grey polka dots. Similarly, a greylag goose might tirelessly roll a volleyball back to its nest while ignoring its actual offspring. Supernormal stimuli are exaggerated versions of natural stimuli that hijack innate response mechanisms, triggering reactions far beyond what nature intended.

Humans, too, are susceptible to supernormal stimuli, and modern media exploits this vulnerability. All of us are born with what Pavlov termed the orienting reflex, i.e., the basic instinct to shift our attention to any novel stimulus. During an orienting reflex, the person moves their head to face the novel stimuli while a higher concentration of blood flows to the brain, the heart relaxes, and the brain becomes ready for processing and learning. From an evolutionary perspective, this reflex is essential for locating predators, prey and partners (Barrett, 2015).

Cocomelon and other media targeting children take full advantage of this reflex. By presenting bright, saturated colours and melodic sounds, this industry can turn the heads (quite literally) of babies as young as 6 months old (that is when babies start orienting towards a television turned on) (Barrett, 2015). Research has also shown that babies across different age groups (from 4 to 9 months) are more attentive to primary colours than secondary colours on average, although variation exists within both categories (Franklin et al., 2008). By frequently changing frames, Cocomelon ensures a constant stream of novel stimuli, keeping young viewers glued to the screen. Essentially, each new frame elicits a fresh orienting response, creating a cycle of attention capture. Result? Cocomelon becomes babies’ cocaine, and they are addicted to it.

Unfortunately, susceptibility to this reflex doesn’t fade away with age. Supernormal stimuli affect adults, too, just in different forms. Short videos on platforms like TikTok and Instagram harness the same principles - offering bite-sized bursts of novelty with every scroll. Each video presents a new supernormal stimulus, keeping our brains hooked in much the same way as Cocomelon does for babies.

As it turns out, we’re not much brighter than a 6-month-old when it comes to the allure of exaggerated stimuli. From candy-coloured cartoons to endlessly scrolling feeds, supernormal stimuli tap into our most basic instincts, reminding us that evolution’s quirks are still very much alive in the digital age. So, the next time you find yourself scrolling endlessly or watching cartoon buses, ask yourself - who’s really driving?

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References

Barrett, D. L. (2015). Supernormal Stimuli in the Media. In Barkow, J. H. (Ed.), Internet, film, news, gossip: an evolutionary perspective on the media. Oxford University Press. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-16999-6_94-1

Franklin, A., Pitchford, N., Hart, L., Davies, I. R., Clausse, S., & Jennings, S. (2008). Salience of primary and secondary colours in infancy. British Journal of Developmental Psychology, 26(4), 471-483. https://doi.org/10.1348/026151007X256672