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Study: Dog Responses Are Similar to Human Infants

By BL Ochman

In scientific experiments, reported by MSNBC Live Science, dogs followed human cues regardless of evidence of smarter strategies, while wolves made logical choices.

Dogs’ responses were similar to human infants, who also prioritize following the example of adult humans.

“Children are programmed to learn from the adult humans, especially when they can’t understand the logic behind the situation — like learning a language. What they have to do is go along with what adults are saying,” the researchers said.

Dogs have been bred to be able to follow human cues when it comes to situations like not eating food off the table, rather than following their own instincts to go for the chicken.

And as anyone who has ever lived with a dog can attest, resisting the instinct to steal the chicken is really, really hard. But this willingness to follow human rules is a key requirement for a domesticated species.

The researchers think the differences between the dog and wolf subjects — both of which had been raised in human captivity in these experiments — arises from genetic traits that have been bred into dogs by humans during 10,000 years of domestication.

Wolves and dogs diverged from a common ancestor at least 15,000 years ago, scientists think. But wolves still need to follow their own instincts to survive in the wild, while many dogs have a cushier existence.

The study was conducted by Michael Tomasello and Juliane Kaminski, scientists from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Germany

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