Studies

Studies & Research

What makes dogs howl, yawn and hide under the bed? Researchers plumb the inner workings of dogs.

Here’s What Dogs See When They Watch Television

Janet Miller | 9/23/2016

Have you ever noticed your dog taking interest in something you are watching on the television? If so, you may have wondered what they might be thinking, or if they are even seeing the same things that we are, or in the same way that we are.

The Way To Dogs’ Brain Is Through Their Noses

by Sheldon Siporin

It’s a beautiful summer day. You and your dog are walking near a patch of grass when she stops dead, then sniffs … and sniffs … and sniffs. Gently, you tug on the leash, but—muzzle buried in the turf—she braces herself and continues her nosework.

Scent is extremely important to dogs, much more so than to humans. All dogs have smart noses. In fact, MRI studies show that when a dog recognizes the smell of a familiar human, the caudate nucleus in her brain lights up, signaling a happy event.

Young Dogs, Old Dogs and New Tricks

Karen B. London, PhD | 9/21/2016

Old dogs CAN learn new tricks, but the way that they learn may be different than when they were younger. So concludes a recent study called “Aging effects on discrimination learning, logical reasoning and memory in pet dogs”. The study was conducted on 95 pet Border Collies who ranged in age from 5 months to over 13 years old. Researchers purposely chose dogs of the same breed in order to minimize any differences in performance that were unrelated to age.

Does Your Dog Make You More Attractive?

by Karen B. London, PhD

The saying, “Love me, love my dog” implies that your dog is a problem—something negative in the whole package of You. Could anything be more ridiculous? While it’s easy to assume that our dogs make us more lovable and even more desirable (I mean, really, how could it be otherwise?), is there any evidence for this point of view?

Comparison of Risk-Taking in Dogs and Wolves

Karen B. London, PhD | 9/8/2016

Humans tend to be risk-averse, which is often illustrated by our decision when offered either $100 or the opportunity for a 50-50 shot at receiving either $200 or nothing. In general, humans go for the sure thing. We are not, as a species, risk-prone, or we would gamble on the shot at getting the bigger payoff.

Dogs Understand Our Words and Intonation

Karen B. London, PhD | 8/31/2016

Humans use both words and the intonation of speech to decipher the meaning of language, and it turns out that our dogs do, too. In a research paper called “Neural mechanisms for lexical processing in dogs” scientists investigated how dogs process the meaning of language. They found that dogs’ brains have even more in common with humans’ brains than previously thought.

How and Why Dogs Play Revisited: Who’s Confused?

by Marc Bekoff

Watching dogs play is very exciting, and there has been a lot empirical research on how and why dogs (and other animals) engage in this activity with boundless zeal. A number of people have asked me to comment about dog play after reading this section in a new book by Raymond Coppinger and Mark Feinstein called How Dogs Work. So, I decided to do so.

Study on Dogs’ Preferences for Praise Versus Treats

Karen B. London, PhD | 8/24/2016

Dogs are well known to be chowhounds. The idea that they love food more than anything else is practically (excuse the expression) dogma in the fields of canine behavior and dog training. The trouble is, recent research suggests that it is not true for all dogs.