BLUEY isn’t just the most-streamed kids show in the country — according to new academic research, the 6-year-old Blue Heeler pup and her family are also modeling something families spend years trying to teach: real empathy.
“Storytelling in films, books and TV can show children how to navigate challenges — not through lectures, but by modeling behaviors like emotional regulation, problem-solving and empathy,” Dr. Bradley Smith, a senior lecturer in psychology at CQUniversity in Australia, wrote in a study republished by ParentMap.
Smith and his fellow researchers watched all 150 episodes of BLUEY’s first three seasons — 18 hours of Bluey, Bingo, Bandit and Chilli — looking for moments where a character faced a setback and responded with resilience. Using a psychological model called the Grotberg Resilience Framework, they found that 73 of those episodes, nearly half, carried a clear resilience message. Almost two-thirds of those moments were sparked by a parent, most often Bluey’s mum, Chilli.
One episode stood out for its handling of empathy specifically. In “Sheepdog,” Chilli tells her family she needs 20 minutes of alone time, leaving Bluey worried she had done something wrong. Later in the episode, Bluey echoes her mother’s exact words back to a toy: “It’s hard work looking after you. I just need 20 minutes.”
That simple moment models self-care and perspective-taking as well as empathy, the study noted. For kids, learning that grown-ups need rest too is a powerful message.
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Movieguide® has tracked this thread in BLUEY before. Kathryn VanArendonk, author of the upcoming book The Bluey Years, told Parents that the show’s emotional honesty is part of what makes it work, according to a February Movieguide® report.
“It’s hard to overstate how powerful it is to have a show like this that does not feel like it’s lying to you about the world,” VanArendonk said. She added that BLUEY doesn’t just teach kids to name their feelings — it teaches parents too, by making “parent emotions visible to kids in a way that they often aren’t.”
None of this is new territory for a show Movieguide® has praised since it landed on American screens. The outlet’s review of BLUEY: Season One called it “wonderfully animated” with “strong family morals and lessons that both children and adults can learn,” noting the positive depiction of Bluey’s relationship with her sister, mother and father and finding it suitable for all ages.
That family-first foundation has only grown BLUEY’s audience. The show was the most-watched program in the country for the second year running in 2025, racking up more than 45 billion minutes watched, and a BLUEY movie is set to hit theaters next year.
For Christian parents hunting for screen time that reinforces what they’re teaching at home, the appeal is obvious. A cartoon that shows a mom modeling patience instead of losing her temper, and a big sister learning to notice when someone else is hurting, does more good in seven minutes than plenty of shows manage in a season. That is worth watching together, ideally with parents doing the asking: What do you think Bluey felt then?
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