On the basis of real life experiments conducted by the researchers, Alexandra Horowitz states in her book ‘Inside of a dog’ that not a single dog responded to the survival situation their humans were acting during the experiment. That, she cites as an evidence to show that dogs’ ability to rescue their humans is exaggerated.
Those extremely critical of her work, rejected this finding claiming that dogs respond on the basis of chemical reactions taking place in human bodies. In the experiments, since all humans were acting, dogs felt no need to respond.
However, I agree with Horowitz. I believe in the worst case scenario. I will not try to swim across Hudson believing that if I begin to drown, my Kuvasz boy will come swimming for me :-)
Humans do smell differently when they are afraid and given how import smell happens to be for dogs I think it’s reasonable that the dog considers the human to be in a different situation then the experimenter wants the dog to think.
Would be interesting to read something on dogs’ theory of humans’ minds. (Like, does a dog estimate a human female is going to feed the baby sooner rather then later and so leaves it alone?)
Great share.
On the basis of real life experiments conducted by the researchers, Alexandra Horowitz states in her book ‘Inside of a dog’ that not a single dog responded to the survival situation their humans were acting during the experiment. That, she cites as an evidence to show that dogs’ ability to rescue their humans is exaggerated.
Those extremely critical of her work, rejected this finding claiming that dogs respond on the basis of chemical reactions taking place in human bodies. In the experiments, since all humans were acting, dogs felt no need to respond.
However, I agree with Horowitz. I believe in the worst case scenario. I will not try to swim across Hudson believing that if I begin to drown, my Kuvasz boy will come swimming for me :-)
Cheers
Humans do smell differently when they are afraid and given how import smell happens to be for dogs I think it’s reasonable that the dog considers the human to be in a different situation then the experimenter wants the dog to think.
Would be interesting to read something on dogs’ theory of humans’ minds. (Like, does a dog estimate a human female is going to feed the baby sooner rather then later and so leaves it alone?)