A lot of technology that we see in the world today are the results of happy accidents, or tech designed specifically for use in a certain way, but yet found much better use in another way. Car companies are a good example of that, where some of the tech they design for use in cars has found use for non-car purposes as well.
In Honda’s case, the company has created a toy called the Sound Sitter which is basically a toy designed to help comfort babies, and how will it do that, you ask? By attempting to mimic the sound of a car engine that will help lull babies to sleep. Honda tested out a variety of car engine sounds based on the cars that they’ve created in the past, and found that in their testing, the top-of-the-line NSX engine was the most effective.
Further testing the sound with babies aged 6 months to 1.5 years, it found that 11 out of 12 babies experienced comfort, while 7 showed reduced heart rates. Honda claims that the reason for this is because the sound of a car engine, which is typically in the lower frequencies (if it’s not you should consider getting it checked), is comparable to sounds babies hear in the womb, which is why it comforts them.
They then took that sound and packaged it into a stuffed toy shaped in a red car which they let parents try with their babies at an event. Unfortunately Honda has no plans to actually turn this into a product, but like we said, it’s interesting to see how some technology can find uses outside of its intended purpose.
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