Your Dog Knows When You Are Upset  

Your pet has a way of knowing when you are feeling down.  The good thing is that they want to help you get better.  Research has shown that when humans cry, their dogs also feel distress.  They will always do something to help when needed!  A recent study had humans make crying sounds to see how dogs reacted to them.  The researching took video of how the dogs behaved in both scenarios and measured the dog’s heart rates for variability between beats, which happened to indicate stress.

Another study put humans in a locked room and gave them the task of having them cry.  Researchers found that dogs who pushed through the door showed less stress than those who didn’t enter the door.  There are a huge range of behaviors involved and sometimes the dogs were indifferent when it came to the crying.

Another test, also known as the “impossible task” determined the strength of a dog’s bond with its owner.  In this scenario, dogs were shown into a room where their owner and a stranger stood on opposite sides of a testing apparatus.  The two people were instructed to stare at each other, but not make any eye contact with the dog.  The dog’s objective was to move a jar on the apparatus to retrieve food underneath of it.  After a couple times, the jar was screwed onto its lid, so that the dogs couldn’t retrieve the food.  What researchers suggested is that openers in the distress condition may have a stronger bond with their owner than the non-openers.

As you can see, dogs truly care about their owners and will do whatever it takes to make them feel better