The 6-7 Effect: Why You Can’t Unsee It
Six and seven used to be ordinary numbers—nothing strange, nothing peculiar, and nothing abnormal with them. That was, until one day, 6-7 became a viral trend. From short videos to social media posts, people would see the numbers 6 and 7 together and react with hand gestures and facial expressions. What started as a simple joke from songwriter Skrilla’s song “Doot Doot (6 7)” and meme edits of basketball player LaMelo Ball’s game highlights quickly spread across the internet as more and more people mimicked it. Before long, classmates and even teachers started saying 6-7, and the reactions became almost automatic whenever these numbers appeared together. In an instant, these numbers seemed to be more noticeable everywhere we looked. In the vast world of social media, in classroom whiteboards, in the receipts you barely glanced at before, and even in casual conversations, these two digits now appear to pop up in the most random places all the time. Now, people can no longer say once everyday things figures 67% or 6 to 7 hours normally without someone doing the trend. All of a sudden, the numbers that once stayed in the background become impossible to miss, and you start to ponder: Why have these numbers turned into something I can’t seem to escape?
What makes the two numbers stand out to both trend joiners and unwilling participants of this viral trend is an effect known as the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon or the frequency illusion. This is a cognitive bias in which someone becomes aware of something once and subsequently perceives it to be happening more frequently, even if there is no actual increase in its incidence. To put it simply, the two numbers were always “just there” to begin with. You may think it’s occurring more often, but in reality, only your awareness of its existence has increased.
This illusion stems from two psychological factors: selective attention and confirmation bias. According to Oxford Languages, selective attention is the brain’s ability to focus on certain stimuli while filtering out others. The moment the trend 6-7 gained traction, your brain started to selectively attend to these numbers while ignoring the others. This causes the numbers 6 and 7 to stand out more prominently compared to other numbers, creating the illusion that these numbers emerge everywhere.
Confirmation bias, on the other hand, is a type of cognitive bias that favors information that affirms your previously existing beliefs. When a person believes that 6 and 7 appear more often, the brain intrinsically remembers each occasion more vividly while ignoring the many times that it does not appear. Over time, the brain gives more importance to the two numbers, making them feel more significant and familiar compared to other numbers.
When these two factors work together, they create the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon, which explains how our minds are prone to notice only what’s relevant to us and why viral trends tend to capture even the smallest parts of everyday life. Just as the 6-7 effect demonstrates, once we catch sight of these trends, there’s no easy way to look away.
