This week’s article explores how the supernormal stimuli are influencing our designs and why we should consciously use them in ethical ways. Human instincts were an essential part of our survival in the past and still play that role today. However, today’s technological world is challenging these instincts in another way that can lead to harmful outcomes.

What are Supernormal stimuli?

Niko Tinbergen spent his career trying to figure out what made animals tick. I find particularly interesting one of his experiments with male stickleback fish.

He wanted to understand what triggers their instinct of attacking other male stickleback fish in the mating period. In short, he tried simulating many qualities of a potential rival to see what makes them defend their territory. He used realistic fish models and even simple oval colored objects.

He found out that a red object even if it doesn’t resemble a fish shape, drives the male stickleback mad. In one instance, the fish even tried to attack the red postal van that was passing outside the building. Can you imagine? It seems these guys hate red color.

In the end, Tinbergen discovered that instinctive responses can be influenced and even exaggerated by manipulating the intensity of the stimulus. Thus the so called “Supernormal stimuli”.

So how does this translate to the human world.

Supernormal stimuli are exaggerated normal stimuli that we’ve evolved to respond instinctively to. People have hard time controlling these stimuli by exercise self-control. This is due to the reason that they are connected to our instincts that are/were essential for our survival.

Imagine a toy so cute you must cuddle and protect. Engineered foods and beverages that contain too much calories and salt that you can’t get enough of them. Games that trigger our instincts like hunting, exploring and etc. Erotic and pornographic content is another example of huge industry that depends on creating stuff taking advantage of supernormal stimuli.