How many pet owners have ever come home to a house full of chewed-up Kleenexes, a puddle on the carpet, and a guilty-looking pooch whose sheepish expression all but exclaims, "I know. I'm sorry,"? According to
a recent study, none.
In one experiment, pet owners were told that their dogs had stolen treats. Most pet owners saw a guilty expression on their wrongfully accused animals' faces, proving that they merely projected human emotions onto their relatively clueless canines.
Alexandra Horowitz, the assistant professor at Barnard College in New York who carried out the research, said, "Given that discovery of, say, a stolen roast or garbage on the floor is often followed instantly by cries of alarm and scolding, it is not surprising that, in retrospect, owners would conflate the sources of dogs' resulting guilty looks. Merely uttering a dog's name with a rising, accusatory tone is often enough to elicit pre-emptive submissive behavior."
Makes you wonder...could we be imagining the super-pathetic please-please-play-with-me look too? The I-love-you-let's-snuggle stare? The OMG-don't-leave sulk?
Nah. Those are definitely real.
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