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Getty Images It's a question pet owners have argued over since we began domesticating our furry friends: Which animal is smarter, the dog or the cat? A study last year said that dogs were the clear winners due to their problem solving ability -- dogs figured out how to pull a string to get a treat, even when faced with two strings, while cats didn't quite understand the concept, according to Live Science. And now, a new study on brain size and social behavior appears to confirm those findings, reports the (U.K.) Telegraph. The study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and led by Dr. Susanne Shultz of Oxford University, looked at the history of the brain in ...

Corbis If you have a deep, dark secret, whom do you tell? According to a recent study in the U.K. by dog-food company Winalot, nearly 20 percent of women confide in their canines, reports The Daily Express. The findings don't stop there. The same study found that 14 percent of women and 10 percent of men believe their dogs can read their minds. (Maybe that's how they always know when it's time to eat!) What about you, readers? Do you whisper your most important secrets into your pets' silky ears? Do you think they know what you're thinking before you utter a word? Tell us all about it in the comments! Tweet Share ...

Getty Have you been wondering if having animals in your house might make your kids more susceptible to asthma? Recent research suggests that the answer is yes -- but only with dogs and only in certain cases. Results of a new study indicate that in families with a higher risk of developing asthma, a canine presence may elevate that risk in children, reports Reuters. The study, led by researcher Dr. Chris Carlsten of Vancouver General Hospital in British Columbia, Canada, showed a three-fold increase in the risk of asthma for children who were exposed to high levels of dog allergen. Interestingly, neither cat nor dust-mite exposure seemed to increase a child's asthma risk. All of the ...

Buckeye the cat snapped this photo of his pal Brutus. Purina Friskies Move over, James Bond. The latest secret agent is a cat -- actually, 50 of them. Purina Friskies recently undertook a brilliant study to find out what cats do all day when they're home alone. They fitted 50 indoor cats with collar cameras to get a cat's eye view of the world. The digital cat-cams snapped a still photo every 15 minutes. By combing through the piles of photos, Purina animal behavior scientist Dr. Jill Villarreal was able to draw some surprising new conclusions about how our kitties fare when they're left to their own devices. (You can see the photos here.) Before the study, most of the cat's owners ...

Beak-to-the-water: macaroni penguins love to swim. A new French study reveals where they go. Photo: Lawrie Cate/Flickr All dressed up, and penguins do have a place to go. For years, zoologists have been trying to figure out where these land-and-sea birds jet off to during their long spells away from home. And now, some French scientists think they've solved the penguin mystery. So where's the secret hideout? The southern Indian Ocean. A team of scientists from the National Centre for Scientific Research attached tiny monitoring devices (weighing less than an ounce) to the legs of a dozen macaroni penguins just in time for their annual voyage, according to a story on Yahoo! News via the ...