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The presence of plush toys in life stages not only makes the owners feel less lonely, but more importantly, plush toys become an extension of social relationships and the past self. One post mentioned: "Whenever I go to a strange place, I will take her along. She will go to places where my family can't always be with me and continue to accompany me through every lonely, uneasy and homesick night of my four years in college." In his book "Play and Reality", psychologist Winnicott pointed out the concept of the transitive object, believing that the existence of the transitive object can help infants relieve the anxiety of separation from their mothers. Chen Wen, a doctor from the Department of Psychology at the Children's Hospital Affiliated to Zhejiang University School of Medicine, refers to this phenomenon of attachment to transitional objects as "the unbreakable little blanket". In this case, the child owners find the memories and feelings of their original social relationships on the plush toys as an extension of their original social relationships.
On the other hand, plush toys, as carriers of memory and emotion, can help children recall important life milestones in the past and enhance their perception of "self-continuity". Self-continuity refers to an individual's subjective feelings towards themselves at different times. That is, despite knowing of various psychological or physiological changes, the core of the Self remains similar, and we are the same person in the past, present and future. Research shows that enhancing self-continuity promotes self-control, a sense of meaning in life, and more effective judgment, decision-making, and action.
In the data, we can see that the time that plush toys accompany their owners ranges from a hundred days to over forty years, and the time span can even exceed that of family members, friends, and partners.
