The Internet offers us infinite opportunities to be entertained. Whether it’s ASMR or a cat playing keyboard, we’re all just a few clicks and taps away from laughing our arses off, finding deep relaxation, or genuine satisfaction. That’s why it comes as absolutely no surprise that in 2019, people have become addicted to watching pimple popping videos.
YouTube channels like Dr. Pimple Popper, the brainchild of California dermatologist Sandra Lee, are pumping out pus-filled clips that rack up views into the millions. Dr. Lee told The Washington Post she refers to this love of zit vids as ‘popaholicism,’ and said “it’s fascinating to me why people love this stuff.”
Let’s be honest: pimples aren’t the most aesthetically-pleasing thing to stare at over and over again, so why are people so obsessed with seeing blackheads, whiteheads and cysts pummelled until they ooze?
Heather Berlin, a neuroscientist at Mount Sinai hospital in New York, told The Washington Post “evolutionarily speaking, it’s normal behaviour to want to remove bumps from your skin,” because they could represent parasites. Berlin added that because of this “human beings have evolved in a way that such behaviour can be pleasurable for them.”
Berlin said watching pimples popping stimulates the nucleus accumbens, the reward centre of the brain that receives dopamine and gives “a little hit of pleasure.”
While plenty of people, myself included, find pimple popping videos seriously satisfying, others find them repulsive.
According to University of Queensland School of Psychology PhD candidate James Sherlock, pimple vids “are reflective of an individual’s disgust sensitivity – the degree to which your behavioural immune system is activated by exposure to cues of disease.”
“What thrills, excites, and disgusts us as human beings tends to be a mixed bag,” Sherlock said. “For instance, most Westerners look on the practice of eating satay crickets with a good degree of repulsion, but the practice is quite common in many East Asian countries.”
And speaking of extreme reactions, the world’s love-hate relationship with coriander presents a similar conundrum. While some people love nothing more than loading up their Vietnamese or Mexican dishes with the leafy herb, others couldn’t think of anything worse.
According to Professor Russell Keast from Deakin University, depending on your smell receptors and genetic makeup, “you may experience a soap-like flavour, rather than the herby flavour others experience,” while eating coriander.
Personally, I love pimple popping videos and coriander, so I guess we’re all different and we should learn to embrace our varied tastes. If worse comes to worst, stay well away from YouTube and ask for your garnishes on the side.