Why am I afraid of dolls?
Ever since I was small I was afraid of dolls staring at me. I used to have frequent nightmares about them coming alive & doing bad things to me. Dolls of any kind give me the creeps. I still rarely have nightmares. I don’t remember how I started becoming so afraid.
You’re not alone in your dread of dolls, my friend. There are many who share your fear, to various extents, and here’s why.
Allow me to turn your attention to something called the “Uncanny Valley:”
In a nutshell, this chart compares our level of comfort with a given thing with how humanoid it is. Generally speaking, the closer to human a thing looks, the more we empathize and are comfortable with it, with our comfort levels obviously maxing out at real, live, healthy fellow people. However, there’s that significant dip towards the right, and that’s what we call the Uncanny Valley—things that are as realistic-looking as possible without being real. Things in this dip create a sort of “heebie-jeebies” response in most people, where looking at those things just feels—wrong. It’s not real, and it shouldn’t look like it is, but… it just is.
Dolls most certainly fall into that category, especially super-realistic ones; the more realistic the doll is, the more likely it is to make you uncomfortable. Some people, such as yourself, are severely affected by this discomfort, while others are only mildly creeped out, but very few people can look at hyper-realistic dolls and androids without feeling something.
Here, as an example:
Don’t worry, no dolls. Nobody here but us androids. It’s likely to elicit a similar response, though, so be warned.
Dolls are meant to impersonate and take on the appearance of a small human being. What may be unsettling about them is that they obviously can’t move, talk, or be alive. In our minds, something that looks like a person is supposed to be alive, so since dolls kinda break this concept, this can be uncomfortable. Their eyes that stare for eternity without ever blinking are also highly unnatural to our mind.
