Human understanding of emotions is influenced by situation.
Owners often do not have a good understanding of the true meaning of their pet’s emotions and can misread their dog, according to a new study.
Researchers at Arizona State University (ASU) ran a pair of experiments to show how humans misperceive dog emotions.
Their study revealed that humans generally struggle to understand their dog's emotions because they base it on the situation their pet is in.
It is thought the reasons for this may include a human misunderstanding of dog expressions due to a bias towards projecting human emotions onto our pets. The study was led by ASU PhD students Holly Molinaro and Clive Wynn.
Molinaro said: “People do not look at what the dog is doing, instead they look at the situation surrounding the dog and base their emotional perception off of that.”
“Our dogs are trying to communicate with us, but we humans seem determined to look at everything except the poor pooch himself,” added Wynn.
In the study, published in the journal Anthrozoos, the team recorded a dog in positive situations or negative situations. The positive situations were things like being offered a treat or the leash, while the negative situations included bringing out the vacuum cleaner or gentle chastisement.
In the first experiment, members of the public were shown these videos with and without their visual background. In the second, the team edited the video, so the dog filmed in a happy context looked like he had been recorded in an unhappy situation, and vice versa.
In both experiments, people rated how happy and excited they thought the dogs were. The team found that people’s perception of the dog’s mood was based on everything in the videos besides the dog himself.
Molinaro explained: “People do not look at what the dog is doing, instead, they look at the situation surrounding the dog and base their emotional perception on that. You see a dog getting a treat, you assume he must be feeling good. You see a dog getting yelled at, you assume he’s feeling bad.
“These assumptions of how you think the dog is feeling have nothing to do with the dog’s behaviour or emotional cues, which is very striking.”
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Two independent vets have launched a podcast to help owners strengthen their bond with pets. Dr Maggie Roberts and Dr Vanessa Howie, who have worked in both veterinary practice and major charities, are keen to use their experience to enable people to give pets a better life.
