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The sense of cuteness is a powerful moral emotion. It inspires us toward care and compassion for babies, animals, and loved ones. It has been called a super-stimulus because of its power to overcome realism and instill care about all kind of strange things. From the point of view of Confucianism, the instinctive response to cuteness supports the Mengzian attempt to ground the virtue of ren (benevolence) in an innate source. Recall that Zhu Xi mentions Mengzi (circa 372-289 BC) using his "child by the well" thought experiment to make much this same point. I wager that Mengzi would have seen the sense of cuteness as a seed to be nurtured as part of his program in training children to be virtuous. 

In the article at the link, philosopher Simon May of King's College in London explains the pervasiveness of cuteness in today's popular culture. How might one use cuteness to teach children about having compassion for others? Were the Confucians right in thinking that innate responses could be a stepping stone in moral education? What are some pluses and minuses of using cuteness as an educational tool? 

https://aeon.co/ideas/why-the-power-of-cute-is-colonising-our-world