Dogs showing guilt does not mean they think they have done something wrong
When dogs are alone at home, they often do bad things. For example, the garbage cans were turned over all over the floor, or the sofa at home was scratched, the furniture was chewed, or the toilet paper was torn up and spread all over the house. However, when we want to get angry at them, they use innocent expressions to extinguish half of our anger. So when the dog makes an apologetic expression, does he really realize his fault?
Perhaps we will scold you at the "crime scene": "Look at the good things you did", "Give me a life" and other words. Then, the dog immediately changed into an innocent and apologetic face, drooping eyebrows, and looked at us with innocent eyes, allowing us to deeply experience that they regretted their actions. However, behind the guilty expression, there is not necessarily a reformed heart.
Ostoichi University of Cambridge conducted a study, the question is "When the owner is not at home, if the dog does something wrong, does the owner distinguish between the dog and the dog?" The meaning of the face." During the study, the dogs were instructed not to eat certain foods they particularly wanted to eat. When the owner leaves the house, the inspector can take any action - take the food away or let the dog eat it. When the owner returns home, he needs to judge from the dog's expression what happened (whether the food was taken away or eaten).
The results showed that the number of owners who predicted that their dogs ate snacks was not more than expected; the dog’s expression has nothing to do with whether it violated the owner’s instructions . Alexandra Horowitz previously conducted similar experiments at Barnard College and obtained similar conclusions. And Horowitz found that when their owners criticized their dogs, dogs with good obedience showed more apologetic expressions. Therefore, Horowitz concluded that the expression of guilt is just a reflection of the owner's criticism, but the dog does not seem to be aware of his fault.
The blame must still be evaluated immediately
"Darwin observed many behaviors related to guilt, such as lowering the head and hiding from the owner's vision. These behaviors also appear in other social non-human primates. Therefore, dogs' "guilt behavior" Not surprised. They show this kind of behavior just because they want to minimize the impact of their behavior on social cooperation, but it does not necessarily mean that they think they are wrong. "Simply put, they just want to stop their owners from treating them as soon as possible. Just accusations.
It is because of this that many people associate the dog's facial expression with emotional guilt. A research team in Hungary found that more than 59% of owners who agree that their dogs feel guilty will not continue to blame their dogs and pursue their faults as long as their dogs show guilt.
And this phenomenon is actually not uncommon in our daily lives. Many owners love their dogs and are indeed very tolerant. Coupled with the innocent look on the dog's face, they can't help but continue to blame the dog. However, in order to get the dog to change these bad behaviors, appropriate blaming is still necessary. Naturally, education can be most effective only when we seize it immediately. Don't be fooled by the dog's expression. Even if they look innocent, we still need to criticize and train them to let them understand that such behavior is not allowed.
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