Bubble wrap
Follow this link to a page with virtual bubble wrap. Click on a bubble and pop it. It’s not quite as satisfying as real bubble wrap. And why is popping bubble wrap so satisfying, anyway? What ancestral activity does it symbolize? Where’s an evolutionary psychologist when you need one?
The Japanese have sheets of bubble wrap manufactured specifically for popping:
One of these is Pucchin Sukatto, a 10 x 10-cm bubble-wrap sheet developed purely for popping purposes. Pucchin is the description in Japanese of the sound made when you pop bubble wrap, and sukatto means to feel refreshed.
To make users feel the latter, the bubble-wrap sheets are made of special polyethylene that creates a sharper sound than your standard bubble wrap when the bubbles are burst.
Bandai makes a toy that simulates bubble wrap, except that the bubbles can be popped over and over again:
March 6th, 2008 at 3:57 pm
Could it be the same pleasure that one gets from popping a pimple?
March 6th, 2008 at 6:56 pm
I thought about that, but I don’t know how common acne was among our hunter-gatherer ancestors. Acne may be a product of civilization, refined sugars and a sedentary life:
http://www.thepaleodiet.com/articles/Acne%20vulgaris.pdf
I think we’re more likely to have an ancestral memory of popping lice during grooming, or popping beetles before eating them.
March 6th, 2008 at 7:20 pm
You could be on to something. In Japan one eats boiled soybeans directly from the pod. The pod is held up to the mouth, and then squeezed gently, very similar to the way in which one presses down on a plastic bubble (or nice juicy beetle) to pop it. The bean, slightly slimy, pops into the mouth, producing a strange pleasurable sensation.–A side note: In Japan I recently had the pleasure of handling a package wrapped with bubble wrap. Three observations: (1) the bubbles were far easier to pop than bubbles on American bubble wrap, (2) there was no discernable sound of popping (I would guess because the bubble wrap was the industrial, not the recreational type), and (3) despite the lack of noise, I still annoyed those around me (popping bubble wrap does not seem to be a universal pleasure).
March 6th, 2008 at 9:26 pm
No…no…I’m going to resist….