New research carried out with “gifted” dogs has discovered why these beloved animals bow their heads.
It is a characteristic movement of which there were many theories.
Now, a team of researchers studied the appearance and direction of head tilts in response to orders from their owners to search for specific toys.
During the tests, the owners asked the dogs to bring their toys by saying their name, for example: “bring the rope”.
After the training, only the genius dogs were able to bring the correct toy. The scientists also found that these animals turned their heads much more frequently than normal dogs during testing.
Researchers believe that the head tilt is a clue to what makes these dogs so successful at learning toy names.
They propose that genius dogs could have bowed their heads more than normal dogs because the commands were more meaningful to them.
According to professionals, this could also indicate that gifted dogs were paying much more attention to what their owner was saying.
“We suggest that the difference in dog behavior could be related to hearing meaningful words (for genius dogs) and could be a sign of increased attention,” the scientists note.
Throughout all the tests, the dogs looked at the owners when they performed the head tilt. At the same time, all the dogs in the study tilted their heads in one direction or the other, suggesting that the direction of the tilt is a stable individual trait.
Editor’s Recommendations
