Category: Uncategorised

Intro

As I browse through the soft toy posts, I’m horrified to see so many anonymous inquiries about whether it’s a mental illness for grown boys to like soft toys. People commented that it’s unmanly for boys to like stuffed animals.

“A man who is truly masculine embraces responsibility and loves, honours, protects and provides for his family and loved ones.”

The saying from Craig Wilkson always occurs to me when comes the masculinity problem.

Secondary Research

In social perspective, this project focuses on the psychological dilemma faced by many adult young men.

In the article Defining a man’s world after macho; Sterotypes harmful to men who may feel pressured to conform; unable to face modern challenges, Concordia sociology graduate student Cheryl MacDonald, who interviewed a number of major junior hockey players about what masculinity means to them, attempts to understand how these “masculine” behaviours are linked to the way in which young men are socialized, how they express their values. 

“I find that hockey players are socialized to adhere to more traditional forms of masculinity, being very tough and competitive, and sometimes those practices become more problematic – men committing suicide, drugs and alcohol and those head shots”

(Nebenzahl, 2012)

“Men dominate at the top and also the bottom,” he points out. “The vast majority in prisons, victims of accidents, victims of work fatalities, 99% of military fatalities – are all male…We need to figure out what it is about masculinity in our culture that is oppressive not just to women, but to men,”

(Synnott, 2009)

“Boys are in crisis,” says psychologist William S. Pollack, author of Real Boys: Rescuing Our Sons From the Myths of Boyhood. “We see it with violence, the recent school shootings, even drug abuse. These boys are cut off from their feelings. They have learned shame. To protect themselves against the shame, they learn what I call a mask of masculinity. If the mask stays in place too long, it hardens and the boys can no longer reach their feelings. So what happens is that some boys can’t cry tears. They cry bullets.”

(News and Thomas, 1998)

Background Research

Previously in April 2022, I’ve made an online anonymous questionnaire for young males age 15-20 to test their perceptions of masculinity. Questionnaire has been distributed to a male pre-college group spcializing for robots creating, and it has received 14 replies.

Questionnaire: https://forms.gle/GEFDonAaKiH3Vk6KA

The results show that about 50% of young males have at least one soft toy in there bedroom, and most of the soft toys are gifts from friends and family.

When they feel upset, about 50% prefer self digestion rather than find emotional support, and only around 7% males try to get emotional support from their soft toys.

When asking about their personal views on masculinity, around 40% still believe the external part like strong and powerful are essential. Surprisingly, I found that more than 80% insist that love and care as well as sense of responsibility are the core section for masculinity.

Experimental Research

Due to results above, I designed a two weeks experiment for those young men who already had a soft toy beside but have no connection with it, to test the capability for young males to build intimate relationship with their soft toys by following the list of suggestions I made to help them interact with soft toys. There are five participants in total, and each of them will receive a private interview with me after 2 weeks period to talk about their feelings and changes.

Suggestion list:

-Name your soft toy

-Put it where you can see it often

-Hug your softie when you feel bad

-Make connection between softie and people/pets related

Quotes from participants:

“When I was in elementary school, my parents once bought me a plush puppy dog, but my parents were working in other places, and I often felt a strong sense of loneliness when I lost my company, so I injected my feelings into this puppy. Later, when I grew up, I gradually didn’t need it. This experiment made me rediscover and embrace it. When I feel sad and lonely, I will talk to it, and I will feel at ease when I hold it in my arms, as if it has life. It stayed by my side, listened to my distress, and comforted me.”

“I have a bunny rabbit named Andy, which is also my name. It was a birthday present from my boyfriend. I used to just put it aside as a doll, but this time I tried to give it a bath and found it to be as cute as our baby. I enjoy spending time with it, it’s like my boyfriend is with me, like a family.”

“There is a teddy bear next to my pillow. When I hold it, my mind is full of childhood memories. The plush toys at that time were not well-made, but the value of the items was given by people. I know that they will be recycled after many years and no one cares about them, but I have poured my true feelings into this little teddy.”

Expert Feedback

As I checked psychological page for male mental health, I found the editor Crystal Reypole, whose work appears on Healthline, and she’s previously worked as a writer and editor for GoodTherapy.

“Men can obtain emotional support through religious or spiritual sources, community activities, or even your pets.…People show emotional support for others by offering genuine encouragement, reassurance, and compassion—These features strongly appear in soft toys.”

Quoted from Reypole

Conclusion

Through secondary research, I figure out “False” masculinity drives males and the society to be mentally unhealthy—Highly praising outer strength, but ignoring or even escaping the inner emotional needs. But through my experiment with soft toys, I am trying to pace step-by-step for males to fulfill their emotional needs, and understand how love and care helps in building masculinity.

I am surprised and grateful to find the intervention result acting positively. It was difficult to find participants at first, since most boys were shy when they were asked to join in the test about stuffed animals, thinking that’s girls favored. I ended up finding 5 guys who were willing to participate, as I suffered a fairly difficult persuasion process. But in afterward interviews, almost everyone managed to form an intimate bond with the soft toy. Both I and the participants are grateful for the opportunity to discover a lovely companion to enrich their lives, which is the most meaningful part in my project.

In future forward, I hope my project will affect more soft toy brands to target on males when designing and promoting their products. Since softies can be for everyone, not tagged as girls favor.

Through some conversations with founders, I sparked the idea of using soft toys as a cure for depression. The focus has shifted from children in faraway war and poverty-stricken areas to my closed friends who are suffering from mental illness. They range from mild anxiety disorders to chronically depressed patients.

Can these once-loved dolls transmit love silently to them, making them feel needed too?

As a result, I searched the professional psychological counseling website, what can I do as a friend for depressed patients? Does effective companionship alleviate their suffering?

The answer is yes.

-”To get out of the depression predicament, a patient needs a process, and all you have to do is to accompany him through this process. If he wants to speak, you will talk with him; if he remains silent, you will be silent with him… What you can do is listen and observe, and satisfy his inner needs as much as possible.”

-“The best things that friends and family can do is simply listen. They often don’t need to say anything, just being willing to listen to your problems makes you feel less alone and isolated”

Quoted from mind.org.uk

https://www.mind.org.uk/information-support/types-of-mental-health-problems/depression/for-friends-and-family/

This has increased my confidence in adopting second-hand soft toys to cure mental illness. Therefore, I designed an experiment to invite two patients with depression to adopt soft toys on the loved before website, and record their psychological changes with the soft toys for two weeks.

Both subjects are my close friends. Since depressed patients lack a sense of security and trust in strangers, I can only observe and record my friends around me. Two weeks after receiving the plush toys, I made a return visit to them online and got the positive responses:

• Rann: I can easily get into a low mood, and sometimes I have no idea why, and I can only watch it get worse and worse. When I received the softie from Loved Before, I saw the freshness and enthusiasm for life in his hazy eyes, I gave it a new name Gary, and I told him that night that no one will ever abandoned, we will always be with each other.

• Ling: I would go into crazy sadness after the hilarity. I often feel that I am a useless person, without the value of existence. I also agreed to participate in this project because I thought maybe these second-hand dolls were the same as mine. But when the little guy came, he made me feel like he needed me, I was the one who was needed, and I felt healed by him.

Q: What do you think is the difference between the company of softies and the company of your friends and family?

• Rann: Because I’m not the only option for family and friends, but the relationship between Gary and I is the only one – I chose him on the adoption site and he chose me to be his partner.

• Ling: I think they are tolerant of me and will not despise me. In my sudden depression, I would cry uncontrollably, but I didn’t want this embarrassing side to be seen by people who care me a lot, because they were anxious enough about my depressive symptoms. But this soft little guy is always with me silently. I know he can understand my feelings, but he will not force me to come out of my emotions immediately.

Concluding

Strengths: The second-hand plush toy market is a rarely touched field, since the development is not mature and the market acceptance is not enough. But Loved Before, a soft toy adoption website, has brought me a lot of inspiration. Combined with previous research on multiple public welfare channels, I am even more convinced that plush toys can deliver love and healing to more people who need psychological comfort. I can also feel from the positive feedback from the two depression patients that second-hand does not mean waste, but means experience and empathy. Although they are not officially medically sanctioned treatments, a soft toy is far more acceptable to patients than antidepressants.

Weeknesses: The experimental sample is not sufficient, because it is difficult to find samples of depressed patients willing to join the program. They are mostly reluctant to socialize and to disclose their symptoms. Thus I can’t use two samples to prove that adopting soft toys can cure depression, only that they are a kind of target for second-hand soft toys.

From this project, I understand that adequate preliminary research can help me get more inspiration: I searched for several ways of public welfare from how to save abandoned plush toys, and got inspiration for using second-hand toys to empathize with depressed patients. Although I reject social networking, in this project, I actively contacted the founder of the public welfare project and the initiator of the second-hand doll website, and achieved effective communication and progress, which broadened my knowledge and contacts in the industry.

Through online research, I found several ways:

“A left-behind child in a remote mountainous area once described the story between him and the plush toy recycling: Due to the fact that his parents go out to work all the year round, the little boy sleeps alone every night. The dark room makes him afraid. He missed his parents very much. Later, through the project of plush toy recycling, he received a plush doll. Every night when he went to bed, he would talk to the little guy whenever he was afraid. Over time, he revealed that he is no longer afraid of sleeping alone, because he is finally not alone, and the idle toys of the children in the city have become his best friends.”

From a conversation with the initiator Duan

http://www.d1kc.com/post-256.html

The Teddy Trust collects teddies and soft cuddly toys from children around the UK and sends them to children who are suffering the traumas of war, starvation or abuse.

http://theteddytrust.wixsite.com/home

A business organization that finds adopters for second-hand soft toys.

https://www.lovedbefore.london/

I messaged them to invite their founder to join my personal interview.

“A few years ago, whilst volunteering in a charity shop, I noticed the amount of soft toys that they were receiving. These items which often held great memories and sentimental value, were being thrown onto a pile and often sold as dog toys (or even worse, into the bin!). I witnessed how the love, and the life and the stories were lost and forgotten, just like that.”

The story I quoted from Charlotte, the lovely founder of Loved Before.

“Loved Before was born in an attempt to change the way we think about, and use soft toys forever. By challenging our perceptions of pre-owned objects, we can show that instead of losing value, a toy once loved is made even more valuable by the love and life it has already experienced.”

I deeply agree with her idea and discuss with her whether it is possible to help more people through second-hand soft toys, such as those who are traumatized and need to be healed. She was intrigued and encouraged me to use the Loved Before platform to find adopters for these little ones who needed to be healed by them.

Here’s a photo that impressed me: stuffed bears slumped in a roadside trash can.

In fact, when I talk to my friends about soft toys, I found most of them owned stuffed animals before but somehow tried to get rid of them because they got older or moved to new places, etc. But as I search for the second-hand soft toys market, these cuties were disliked because they were second-hand, and more people answered in interviews: Why not buy a new one?

Thus my topic was born: how to pass on love with second-hand soft toys and help them get rid of their abandoned fate?

What

My research area is focus on soft toys (i.e. stuffed animals) and human psychology . Previous research questions are from “Why adults need soft toys” to “Why some adults men feel ashamed when they need soft toys”. Through times of research, I assume that it’s not a simple social problem merely for adults men, but a growing experience that convinces males to be rational and powerful, which lack of sensible care for themselves.

For project 6, my research question will be: How do younger generation boys understand masculinity? Do they use stuffed animals to gain emotional support?

Why

This is a continuous research based on project 5. Last research through interviewing numbers of young adults, I recognize that “false” masculinity drives males and the society to be mentally unhealthy—Highly praising outer strength, but ignoring or even escaping the inner emotional needs.

I hope that through the emotional outlet of stuffed animals, more males around the world will realize the importance of inner emotional support, and more females will understand and be considerate of the men around them. Meanwhile, I also appeal to the society not to differentiate the love of soft toys by gender, since both men and women deserve support and company from cute “partners”.

How

I’ve made an anonymous questionnaire for teenager boys age 15-20 to know their perceptions of masculinity, comparing with previous research results aged 20-30, so as to test my assume for males’ growing experience to be the key variable of their perception of masculinity. Questionnaire has been distributed to a teenager club specializing for robots creating, school gyms, etc and gradually received answers.

Questionnaire: https://forms.gle/GEFDonAaKiH3Vk6KA

Moreover, I’m going to interview one of the teachers or coaches closest to these kids individually, asking for more interviewers’ mental health conditions: e.g. What is the general picture of boys he/she observes? What kind of teen boys might suffer from lacking emotional outlet? Then I will reach out personally to those boys who need extra emotional support by interviewing their growing environment. This is for knowing exactly how society could build a healthy concept of masculinity in young age children.

WHAT IF:

My findings are more socially relevant, since mainstream media focus more on Feminism, but women are calling for gender equality. Humans are born to be sensible and rational, but why shall we differentiate theses two in genders? I hope that research on soft toys can help males recognize their inner need for emotional support and rediscover masculinity, no matter what generations they are in.

If possible, I would seek out male mental health care organizations/ to work with soft toy brands, e.g. promoting charitable ads and campaigns to raise awareness of men’s mental health—This could be a commercial activity to place annually, to encourage men no matter in what age, to share the experience when they need emotional support, as well as expand consumer groups for soft toys. Therefore, both sides of stakeholders gain from the activity. After the end of the course, I could try working as an organizer for the brands company.

Current answers received in questionnaire:

I have seen in the Chinese social media that many Chinese male youth are ashamed to show the soft toy on the bedside to outsiders, because they think it is a companion toy only for girls, so that boys are not allowed to collect them. I opened Zhihu, a Chinese question-and-answer app, and searched for the entry that boys like plush toys, and found that more people are asking for help whether these boys have mental illnesses, like whether it is a fetish, etc. I was shocked and even depressed by people’s judgments and tried to change this stereotype.

My research is focusing on Chinese market. Along with thousands of years’ Confucian education, Chinese men are endowed with underlying stereotypes: restrained, powerful, brave and tenacious. These so-called Masculinity are deeply imprinted on their subconsciousness, that they feel it difficult to expose emotional side. Therefore, soft toys are considered a secret emotional exit—They stay quietly besides, soothing the males’ soft side with companionship and listening.

In order to truly understand how Chinese young men feel on collecting plush toys, I did an anonymous questionnaire: the data was collected from 20 Chinese boys aged 20-25.

Five questions were asked in the survey:

1. How many soft toys accompany you in your daily life? This is for knowing young male’s need on soft toys.
2. Would you hide their origins (falsely claiming that they were given by others or not yourself) or even dared to let your friends see these softies? This question is based on the social phenomenon above that I am impressed with.
3. In what way do they accompany you? This is a multiple choice question, to know what those toys normally engaged in their daily life.
4. What emotional state are you usually in when you need their company? This is a reverse question knowing how men feel when they need accompany, e.g. excited, stable or frustrated, etc.
5. Do you think their company eases your inner emotional needs? This is a short answer question, and I received some interesting comments from the investigators

According to data results, around half of young men in China have at least one soft toys with them, and almost half of those softies collectors choose to hide plush toys because of shamefulness. The function of the softies are mostly “quiet accompany”, and then “listening”. Some of the men collectors are fond of simulating dialogue between toys—this can be seen as fulfilling social need. Moreover, results show that men need soft toys when they are both emotionally stable and depressed—This also verifies the results of the previous question: Men need more companionship and listening.

 Comments from those male investigators are valuable as well:

— “I regard them as my tree hole, and their listening and company gives me a lot of security.”

— ” …it’s a stand-in for my puppy, a family role to me.”

— “They made me feel needed and it was my responsibility to protect them.”

Men’s desire for protection and responsibility are fully reflected in the plush toys. Simultaneously, they also gain emotional comfort from soft toys.

To conclude, soft toys have no gender undertones, they deserve to be treasured by people of all genders and ages. Men are able to have an emotionally soft side, just like women sometimes act masculinary. We’re not only talking about a stuffed toy, but a kind of social gender equality. While our society highlights the equality of women, the inner needs of men also need to be cared for. Chinese society has a fairly high demand for men’s external abilities, because men generally need to take on more responsibilities to earn money and support their families, but paying little attention to men’s emotional needs.

I hope that Chinese society will be more tolerant of men’s emotional needs, so that men can truly face up to their inner sides. I call on reputable toy brands and psychology experts to organize a joint event for men who like plush toys, to build a healthy social masculinity, to look for social empathy on men, by sharing their stories with soft toys accompany.

4/25 Further Research questions:

Investigate some man support psychologist/sociologist/groups, asking what masculinity can be/ what soft toys can do to help them gain emotional needs? What other ways do men gain emotional support other than soft toys? Why some men choose soft toys instead of other ways to ease their mood?

Men can obtain emotional support through religious or spiritual sources, community activities, or even your pets.
…People show emotional support for others by offering genuine encouragement, reassurance, and compassion—These features strongly appear in soft toys.”

From psychological tutor in Men support group

Quick Questions with boys aged from 14-17:

1. Do you have stuffed animals in your bedroom？
2. Why/Why not do you have them? （Self collecting, a gift from others…）
3. If you like them, do you think their accompany partly fulfill your emotional needs or ease your bad mood?
4. Would you be ashamed if guests come and see them in your bedroom?
5. Do you think collecting soft toys is not suitable for men? Do you think it offend your masculinity?

Research direction: Male’s growing experience/education

Regarding the stereotype of society’s masculinity, such as being strong, brave, not weak, etc., is it instilled invisibly from the childhood education of boys? Could this be the reason why they need/don’t need soft toys?

Before starting, I would like to share my personal experience of collecting plush toys. This picture is a family photo I took to my soft friends who have accompanied me for a long time: some of them were close friends who grew up with me, and some were acquired through special experiences. They have gone with me through many important moments in my life, giving me a soft outlet for my social resistance. I treat them as my family, even as part of me.

As for me, a box of uncertainties is questioning the psychology behind those adults who adore softie toys like me – How can stuffed toys cure adults？What inner need do adults seek and meet from those softies?

Here’s a video I found interesting on YouTube that is sharing his own experience with his stuffed animal named Pokey. He treated Pokey as his partner who has accompanied him through rough time.

When I was first diagnosed with psychosis, I formed an attachment to a stuffed animal. Since then, I have created a bond with him and sleep with him every night. He is comforting to me … a security blanket, of sorts. I believe that he has feelings, so I hesitate to remove him from my bed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_n9Jnw39cO4

He believes that Pokey has feelings just like him, and he needs Pokey’s company to feel comfortable.

Moreover, the comments below seem to feel more belonging…

Comments show that many adults who are not socially active prefer to talk to the plush toys they grew up with, and such familiar companions can soothe their emotions. Then I start thinking if it’s a common phenomenon, that adults need cure from softies in a spiritual level. But what psychological features are hiding behind adults’ poor nerves?

A psychology report written by PsychReel states 3 reasons why people are so attached to their stuffed animals:

1. It represents a time in your life where you were happy and content.

2. It was given to you by someone you are extremely attached to.

3. You have difficult patterns of attachment in your life overall.

https://psychreel.com/why-am-i-so-attached-to-my-stuffed-animal/

The report also mentions that memories can evoke strong responses from people, and in cases where something like a stuffed animal is involved, touching the soft cloth or hugging the animal may feel comforting and familiar, especially if the person is experiencing stress in the current stage of their life. Psychology theories behind adopting stuffed animals imply that they might simply be treating it as a transitional object, and that the adult might be attached to the stuffed animal because they are memorabilia of a simpler, happier time.

Due to Joseph Burgo, Ph.D, a clinical psychologist and psychoanalyst, he has conducted a study on the subject of adults with stuffed animals by the hotel chain Travelodge and tried to find adults with stuffed animals and how these are used as comfort objects in the United Kingdom:

25 percent of male respondents reported they take their teddy bear with them when going away on business. Many said the bear reminds them of home and a cuddle helps them to nod off.

51 percent of British adults said they still have a teddy bear from their childhood and the average teddy in Britain was 27 years old, the survey said.

One-in-ten single men surveyed in England admitted they hide their teddy bear when their girlfriend stayed over, while 14 percent of married men reported they hide their teddy bear when any family and friends came to visit.

15 percent of men versus 10 percent of women reported they treat their teddy as their best friend and will share their intimate secrets with their bear.

26 percent of male respondents stated it was quite acceptable to have a bear regardless of your age.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/shame/201806/no-shame-in-adult-comfort-dolls

It has long been assumed that when adults mature and learn to self-soothe, they give up their security blankets and their stuffed animals, but clearly, this is not the case, and it could be assured that this may be because of rising nostalgia in society or simply because psychological theories weren’t built to last through major changes and therefore did not account for psychological evolution of human beings, but whatever the reason, it is evident that not all people give up their comfort objects.

Conclusion

When their company has become a habit, we are like a heroic warrior with a solid backing, enabling us to have a warm hug that will always wait for us after struggling in the adult world. Psychologically speaking, they are our source of comfort. But only we know what a blessing it is to have someone who will always support you, love you, and wait for you to come home, as long as we return from the adult world.

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