The Psychology of Dogs

0:00Welcome back to Everything's Psychology. Today we're chatting about the psychology of the animal that's curled up at your feet, or maybe snoring on the sofa, or maybe even currently staring at you, willing you to open the treat drawer. It's been the most requested topic after I previously did the Psychology of Cats episode. This week we're talking

0:30about the psychology of dogs. We think we know them better than any creature on Earth, but what is actually going on behind those adorable eyes? Do they love us as completely as we think? And how much of canine psychology involves the human at the other end of the lead? With me to unpack the psychology of dogs are Professor Daniel Mills, Professor of Veterinary Behavioural Medicine at the University of Lincoln, and co-author of Life Skills for Puppies and Being

1:03Your Cat, and Hannah Grice, trainer and clinical animal behaviourist and author of Playing With Your Dog. Hello both of you. Hiya. Hi. Daniel, I'm going to start with you. I did a bit of googling, and it said that we've lived alongside dogs for something like 30,000 years, which is longer than any other animal. So what did dogs figure out that bonded them to humans? So you're quite right, dogs are the first domestic species, and it's interesting that it's a, you know, a companion

1:36animal for us now, rather than a farm animal. Almost certainly, you know, dogs exploited an opportunity that they saw, and there's various theories as to why that might be. One is that humans were creating waste from, they were killing more than they could consume, and therefore those wolves that were less afraid of humans could actually access that food source and therefore wheedle their way in. Another theory is that in the course of hunting, that maybe sort of

2:15modern humans may actually have done more to injure, particularly the large game they were going after, and wolves are very good at that long trekking, and they may have ultimately delivered the final kill, and then the humans arrive with their spears, etc., get rid of the wolves, and so actually you start to get a mutual relationship in hunting, because the humans can access these large game, but they depend on the wolves for the tracking and for perhaps the final kill, but then can chase them off. So there's that

2:47sort of mutual benefit in terms of access to food, and those that are, you know, don't attack their humans may have been more tolerated, and so the whole process goes by. And, you know, that's a much, I think, more sensible model than thinking that wolves or humans thought about this and thought, hmm, I want to be with you. You know, they're not actually thinking that much about it, they're taking the opportunity at that stage. And... So it's like a mutually beneficial arrangement to start with, that the dogs were tools for us,

3:20but also they gained something from us as well. Yeah, absolutely. And although there's, people have argued of where were dogs first domesticated, it seems there were a number of failed dog domestications in various places, and it wouldn't be surprising if, yeah, you know, that dogs were domesticated in several places round about the same time, because similar circumstances arose. Yeah, okay. Hannah, I guess the other animal that we most closely have a relationship with is cats as well. Is that a different kind of relationship that we have with cats than

3:54we have with dogs, do you think? I say yes, because, you know, their communication styles were different and their evolutionary history is different. You've just been listening about how we cooperated with one another, or dogs were opportunists in having that waste and being used for hunting, whereas, you know, cats evolved more as solitary hunters. So I think when it comes down to the relationship, certainly they're quieter in their communication signals, so they may rub against us, whereas a dog might

4:30be more overt with the full-body waggle. So it would be unfair to use the cliche that dogs are more loving and cats are aloof, but I think it's that cats have evolved in a different way to our dogs, and they're much more subtle. So I do know, not only being a cat owner, but when we look at the research, you know, attachment styles do have parallels with infants and their parents as well as with dogs, and there's been various different research around that.

5:03Christian Vitale has done some around cats that showed that they did have insecure and secure attachment-type patterns with their caregivers. So I think, yes, there's a definite bond there between cats and their owners. It's just that the relationship's different, not lesser. Does that make sense? Yeah, yeah. I like how you described it there. It's just a subtle sort of love, and it's a different sort of thing there. And I guess cats could be seen as a tool in some respect. You've

5:33got the stories of cats being used as mouses on farms and used to keep pest control down. So they had a purpose to be welcomed into the human environment to start with. I mean, maybe I'm just being, you know, a cat owner and a dog lover and an animal lover. But whilst this sort of talk of tools and being useful and this symbiotic relationship is nice, they're just so adorably cute, fluffy, warm things to hold. Is there like an evolutionary pull, mammal to mammal, that we just want to love

6:07them as well? Daniel? Yes, certainly. In the case of dogs, we know that there's a whole sort of physiology which may also sort of kick in. So, you know, we like to think of ourselves as very sophisticated and sort of logical. But actually, we respond to very superficial characteristics. I'm sure many people, you know, you've seen dots on a screen moving and somebody said, oh, that's a person walking. It's just a group of dots. And we, you know, our brains fill in the rest and they try and make those things familiar. It's very similar, isn't it, to pareidolia. Now, pareidolia is the effect

6:41where we see faces where there are none. So, you might see a face in the coffee bubbles or something like that and go, it's a face. Yeah, so absolutely. So, what we see in dogs is, and in humans, is they are attracted to each other's faces. And in humans, when we see things like big eyes, high foreheads, short limbs, actually, that brings out a nurturing in us. So, you know, so we can be attracted to particular types of dogs. And we've actually done some work. We've not published it yet. But

7:15what we found is that people who tended to keep these short-nosed breeds of dogs that have these features actually were much more sensitive to these features in general. And they were sort of, they, and that sort of, they seem to have more caring in terms of what they wanted to care for. And that was a big part of what they wanted in the relationship. Now, there is a downside to that because obviously the extremes of short noses have all sorts of health problems. And we also are

7:46starting to think that one of the other things that brings out that caring instinct is like a toddler's gait, which is uncertain. But what that means when we transfer it to dogs is we're attracted to dogs who aren't walking properly. So, dogs who've got actually lamenesses or been inbred and got all sorts of issues. So, you know, the biology can play with our minds as well. And we're attracted to these things. The problem is... Because almost they feel helpless and they need our help.

8:17Yeah. So, because we've got this strong nurturing. Does it... I'm going to ask a stupid question, but that's my job here. Does the idea that we like dogs that have that baby-like features, as you mentioned, the high foreheads, big eyes, you know, type thing, and therefore gets that nurturing response, does that have any connection to the maybe myth of animals looking like their owners and therefore they pick a dog that almost looks a bit like them? Or do you think that's not true in the slightest? It's not a myth, actually. There have been studies where you've looked at people's preferences and

8:52they are more likely to select individuals that have some resemblances. So, again, from a biological point of view, we choose a mate, and I'm not saying we're obviously choosing dogs as mates, but we're attracted to individuals who look somewhat similar to us, but are different. And when it comes to a mate, you don't want them to be too similar because they could be too closely related and, you know, inbreeding is not good, but they would need to be reasonably similar because

9:22you don't want to have sex with a gorilla, you know, because that's not going to be very successful biologically speaking. So, there is that sort of attraction. And again, you know, just to show you how tight the sort of bond is, when we look into the eyes of each other, whether it's a human looking into the eyes of a dog or the dog into the eyes of a human, then we get oxytocin released, which is the big bonding chemical that is really important. So, you know, it's more than just sort of a simple learned response. There's a very strong biology behind this.

9:56Interesting. And Hannah, you train dogs and you help owners with new puppies and dogs. So, you get to see this every day. Just out of interest, have you had it so that you had an owner and their dog and you've just gone, wow, you look so similar? Yeah. To be honest, we do have a giggle sometimes in the puffy classes when, you know, the red setter walks in and the lady's got gorgeous red locks, you know, or the curly coated dog with the lady or gentleman with very curly hair. So, yeah, there is a sweeping statement to say that, of course, but,

10:32you know, the owners tend to be very open and have a giggle themselves and it's not something they've not heard before, put it that way. I don't know. I think we are innately, you know, birds of a feather that flock together. So, perhaps, you know, that element is there when we're choosing our pets, but there has been some work done where it was Clive Wynn and some of his colleagues were looking at periods of dogs in terms of age and development where we're most attracted to them and around

11:06about the really early weeks. So, we're talking sort of four or five weeks of age where they're cute, but, you know, they're still a bit too infantile looking, you know, compared to an eight-week or 10-week-old. And then they had another look at sort of 16 weeks and then 20 weeks and so on and so on. And what was really interesting, peak attractiveness to these two groups of puppies that they used to show the participants was around that eight to 10-week marker. And they suggested that that's

11:42possibly, you know, that hardwired pull to want to care for this cute, vulnerable creature triggering those caregiving responses because that's the time naturally mum will go, okay, off you go, I'm done now. And so I thought that was really interesting when you were chatting about attractedness beyond just physical appearances, you know, there seems to be something hardwired in terms of the development when we're, you know, surrounded by those puppies at certain ages, they kind of lose

12:13their cuteness once they hit puberty, as it were. There's another bit to this story as well, because there's also studies that show that as far as personality goes, there's, there's, it's not random, the personalities of the owners and their dogs, and there is a degree of matching in personalities to a degree. So, you know, it's, as Hannah says, it's not a very strong correlation, the physical appearance, but it is more than random. And the same actually can go with aspects of personality as well.

12:43How amazing. Yeah, I was going to ask Daniel to, to expand about where there's been research, not to say that anxious or neurotic owners, if they were doing an assessment and they came out of that, always have neurotic or anxious dogs. However, I wondered if you could just develop on some of the research that has shown that, because that's really interesting, I think, for some of the listeners or those viewers who are into psychology, how those personalities can sort of transfer, as it were, or be seen

13:18with dogs as well. Yeah, and it's an interesting one, because the, the, one of the areas where there is a strong link between personality traits is anxiety, neuroticism in the typical human literature. The difficulty, though, with a lot of this work is, especially when you talk about the anxiety, a lot of anxious dogs have all sorts of behavior problems, as you and I both know, working with them. So, is the person's anxiety because they've got a dog that's showing aggressive behavior? And to what,

13:50or is the person's anxiety causing anxiety in the dog? Now, we certainly know that, you know, you can simply get an owner, you know, who is anxious, if you can get them to relax the way they hold the lead, the dog's behavior will change. It's not a cure, but when they're tense and they hold the lead in a tense way, then, you know, the dog will be much more anxious. And there's lots of ways in which humans, unfortunately, sort of miscommunicate. A classic example is when the dog is anxious,

14:24you know, there's a number of things that people do. You know, most people we hope now know, but not everybody, that you shouldn't tell your dog off when they're anxious, because if you do, you're telling the dog, there is someone to be scared of, I'd become moody and nasty. So, you shouldn't ignore the dog, because then the dog doesn't know that you've, you've clocked what they, was making them anxious, because that doesn't help them. So, they don't get any support. Nor should you actually

14:54I'll tell you what you should do in a minute. Because when you try to console them, what you typically do is, you know, you say, oh, poor dog and whatever. And just me saying that immediately, I've leant forward and hunched my shoulders. I've made myself small. And when we sort of speak in these tones, they're not a normal tone. And what the dog almost certainly reads in that situation is they see you making yourself small, talk more quietly, talk in these strange tones. And so, from the dog's point of view, oh my God, my human is worried as well. So, that doesn't help the dog.

15:30So, what we've developed, one of the protocols we've developed here is what we call the sensitive carer. And I always tell the story of my mum in this, because I'm the youngest of five kids. My mum had one of us one year after the other. So, she had five kids under the age of five. Well, you know, we would be in the garden, fall out of a tree, come in crying, and my mum would kiss it better and tell us to go and play. Because, and that was actually brilliant, because that is what a sensitive carer does. First of all, she acknowledged my distress. That's the kiss. And then she told me to go out

16:03and play. I.e., you fell out of the tree, it was an accident. It doesn't mean that life is dangerous. So, what we do with the dogs is when the dog is anxious, you say, what was that? And again, the way that you talk about it is in a much more upbeat. So, you're acknowledging that something strange has happened, but your tones don't communicate the fear. You connect with the dog, and we've talked about the importance of connecting with the dog. And then our behavior, we show interest in something else. We show interest in perhaps in the dog's toy without

16:34talking to the dog directly. And this is important, because we then focus on something that the dog really likes. And the dog chooses to say, oh, well, yeah, you were startled as well, in effect, but you're interested in this. So, obviously, it's not that important. And that breaks the cycle of making matters worse. And when the dog eventually comes around and looks at you with those big eyes and says, oh, can I play? You ignore them for a couple of seconds, and you say, oh, hello. And you ask them to do a couple of unrelated things before you give them the toy. And again, that just avoids

17:07inadvertent reinforcement to the behavior. So, you know, that's the way to manage when a dog is anxious. I know it's gone off tangent, but we're here to chat about anything and everything. Exactly. Yeah. It sounds, you've brought it in with your example with your mom, but it sounds very similar to young children, where a child who falls over, often who hasn't really hurt themselves, but it's a shock, look to the caregivers, look to the adults first to see what reaction they're getting. And if it's a worried reaction, is it, are you all right? And they will then start to cry. Whereas if, again, you upbeat, you know, oh, what happened there? Yeah, come on,

17:41brush that off. And then distraction. Oh, look at that. You know, should we go to the ice cream van? Then normally it's, you know, a fine reaction. It sounds similar, upbeat tone and distraction. Absolutely. It's exactly the same. It's where we've borrowed it from the human psychology. Yeah. And if you loop back to your original question about have they figured us out, Daniel's points that he's just made are all linked to the fact that those thousands upon thousands of years of domestication, what they have developed is being blooming good at reading us. You know,

18:17whether that's our tone of voice, whether that's our facial expressions, where we're looking, pointing, where our body is, you know, the point about you leaning in, Daniel, and so on and so on. And then some of the work that Gregory Burns has done, they train dogs to lay in FMR scanners. And in real time, they're watching what happens when we change our tone of voice, or we stick a bit of food near them. And so all of this fantastic research with the underbelly of human psychology has really helped. I think it's important to make, yeah, and to make the point though, that there is a tendency for us to

18:54think that because dogs behave in very compatible ways with us, that they're thinking in the same way as us. But the point that Hannah's made, I think, is also that they're very good at reading us. Dogs are incredibly observant. And they will pick up on those nuances. We did some work many years ago with some colleagues in Brazil, where we basically set up an experiment where we had a giver and a receiver. And the dog needed help in accessing something. And ordinarily, you know,

19:25you would go with some, if you see somebody giving something, and somebody taking something, got a choice, most people will go with the person who is giving, because you can see that they give, they give resources. And so we had two actors dressed similarly, but we put them as Hattie or neutral or angry, and match that against givers and receivers. And the dogs always went with the happy face. So it doesn't matter whether you're the giver or receiver, if you were happy, I want to be

19:56with you. And that's what they're really tuned into. Because, you know, an angry human is not a good individual to be hanging around with, you know, if you think about it. So they weren't analyzing the motivations, and thinking, oh, who's giving, who's receiving, they would observe it. But they were focusing more on who's, you know, who's happy. And we've seen that with sweat tests, as well. So where they've done cognitive bias tests with dogs, so they've had unfamiliar people doing some sort of

20:28exercise or whatever, and then a neutral group, and then sort of, you know, calming exercise. So then they present the different types of sweat to the dogs. And then they've also taught the dogs at the same time that a box in one location typically predicts food, a box in another typically predicts there's no food. And then they put a box somewhere in between, and they watch the dogs having been presented with different types of sweat. The ones that were presented with the stress sweat,

21:02where they found that they were more likely not to investigate. So more pessimistic, let's say, than those that weren't presented with the human stress scent. So I think that's interesting beyond just the facial expressions as well. So obviously, they've got fantastic olfactory systems, but they're using that information as well. So coming back to the point about if we're stressed and anxious when we're on a walk, because our dog may lunge or bark, they're going to pick up on all sorts of

21:34information, not just what's going on in the environment. So we have to take that into account as practitioners, what's the human end, you know, what's happening at the human end as well. Yeah, yeah, that's really interesting. And what I'm hearing, and do correct me, is that if dogs are really good at reading us, whether it be facial expressions, tone of voice, scent, are they manipulators in order to get what they need, or do they love us? And as part of my research on this episode, I did a walkies

22:06online, and I consolidated lots of questions that people asked on Reddit and Quora to see what's the most asked question that people asked. And strangely, the most asked question, number one, was, does my dog actually love me, or has it just worked out that I'm the one that opens the food? So are they manipulators, or do they actually love us, Hannah?

22:27Well, with my Labrador, probably both. But what I would say is, yeah, I mean, I would say dogs love, and we've got to be careful how we sort of explain what that means. But certainly if I come home, or an owner comes home, and they're getting the whole full body waggle, you know, we would see signs that we would say, we would attribute to love. Yeah, they're pleased to see us, they're happy to see us upon reunion, or happy to play with us. But I think in terms of food, if we kind of go back to

23:03reducing our relationship just about food, I think that's a disservice. Because, God, if you look at the early work around cupboard love, and then Harlow's monkeys, he showed that actually, those monkeys wanted to have the comfort of the blanket monkey, rather than the wire monkey holding food. So, you know, there has to be safety, there has to be trust, predictability in the relationship, warmth. And I think that's where the love then stems. But you can still have a client, I've got clients who

23:34absolutely adore their dogs, they love their dogs. And seemingly, the behaviours of the dog towards them would, we could say, are love. But at the same time, the dog may be destroying the house, or, you know, biting the owner when they've got a valued item. And that can be really confusing for clients. And that's when the relationship can break down. Yes, okay. And just to carry on that topic of love, Daniel, I'm going to come to you on that, because you've mentioned earlier that when dog owners look and gaze into each other's eyes, they get a spike of oxytocin, that bonding

24:07hormone. So, is that love when the chemical romance kicks in? It's one of the things that contributes to that sense of love. Yeah. And, you know, I think I agree with Hannah that, you know, dogs love us, but in a doggy way. And that's, but that, it's, you know, some people do say, yeah, dogs are like cuckoos in the nest, they're just exploiting us in the same way as a cuckoo does. They're not, as I said, they're not thinking about it in that way. They have a bond with us. And when we think about bonds and relationships, you know, bond is a reason

24:41to be together. We spoke earlier about, you know, why dogs and humans come together, and there's a mutual gain. And you can be very transactional about that and say, well, they're only interested in the resources. But actually, bonds are often more than that. Humans, you know, yes, we might just have a business relationship. But actually, that's a bit alien to dogs. So, if you're going to work with someone, you have an affiliation with them. You know, that's the whole point

25:13of an affiliation is we're better together, we achieve more things together. It's a very human thing to sort of be cynical about that and say, well, you're just exploiting the niche, because that's a cognitive process, whereas these bonds are very emotional, and they're certainly there. So, when we think about a relationship, we can think about it in terms of, yeah, affiliation, which is we are better together. We can think about it in terms of caregiver and care receiver. I'm looking for you to provide me with things. I'm a care receiver. But also, there's an element

25:44of I will care for you. You've got a guard dog. So, and they will conceptualize the relationship if they're clear within those sort of boundaries. And these can all come together. Hannah mentioned earlier about attachment. Attachment, the word attachment is used in a variety of different ways. And in dogs, there are clear signs that the sort of characterization that we see of attachment in infants is a reasonably good model for dogs. But it's not totally there. And there

26:19are issues even, as I'm sure you know, in the human field with attachment and attachment tests that are very culturally biased towards Western societies. And, you know, with dogs, yeah, they will certainly act as a care receiver, and they will receive care from those individuals. And they will have a degree of exclusivity. In the case of cats, we're less certain about how exclusive cats are. I was trying to ask about the cat difference. Yeah. Yeah. So, to what degree is it social support rather than a true, you are my carer? Dogs certainly

26:55do make that discrimination. But they also form very quickly that relationship. And again, just to pick up on the sort of original ideas of attachment from Bowlby and Ainsworth and the Westernized view is that put a lot of emphasis on the mother or the primary carer. Well, in Africa, you know, the saying is it takes a village to raise a child. And when African mothers, native African mothers have seen things like the Ainsworth test, they've been horrified the fact that you abandon a child, you just

27:28wouldn't do that. But they, so in the case of dogs, what's important is they will have individuals that they prefer and they will have that attraction. Do you want to call that love? Yeah. I think, you know, they see similar physiological changes. There's a calming effect and factors like that.

27:49And there is a degree of exclusivity as to who they offer that to. So, you know, not everybody is equal. So, I think that's, I think that's love. Yeah. Okay. Well, I think we've, we've got the dog owners back on side again. I think we are, we'd say they, they, they do love you. Good. Um, and we talked about attachment there and it, it led me to, I asked basically my dog owning friend, Sarah, uh, if anything she wanted to ask. And she mentioned that her dog, she described as totally attached himself to her and won't leave her alone. I mean, more than her husband, more than their child, more

28:25than anyone comes to visit. But she also said, the reason she's worried about that is because she feels that it doesn't give him joy, that he gets very anxious when he leaves. And she said, she's worried she's in a toxic doggy relationship. It's, she's, it's not, she's not far off point. Um, people sometimes talk about, yeah, Velcro dogs are hyper-attached dogs. As you know, in the human literature, hyper-attachment doesn't exist. And actually what we're now realizing that those Velcro dogs, a lot of them are actually suffering from what we, a form of insecure attachment.

28:57In the same way as, you know, um, you might drink a lot because you want to drink a lot, but you might drink a lot because you're dehydrated. And those dogs are sticking close to their humans, perhaps because for some reason, it's not necessarily the human's fault. They're not getting all the requirements of a secure bond or secure attachment from that owner. Sometimes it is associated with inconsistent behavior. Um, so if an owner is inconsistent with their dog,

29:28and this is why it's important not to use punishment, because if you use punishment with your dog, how does your dog know I can be safe with you? So you might achieve good behavior with the dog, but psychologically, the dog doesn't know that they're safe with you. And that's, you know, that's a concern. Yeah. Hannah, you, you must get lots of people coming to you with anxiety problems, whether it be that Velcro dog thing. What do you say to them? What do you help them with in order to come out of that and get a better relationship with their, with their loved dog?

30:00I'm going to say, Dan has done a lot of work on this. So, um, I think he's in a better place to describe some of the, the research around it, because I personally don't like saying, using the term anxiety to describe everything. I like to ask a lot more questions. I'm going to defer to Daniel first, if that's okay, to give you the broader answer. Of course, of course. So, I mean, what we tend to do is assuming we do, we did develop a scale looking at owner caregiving style, um, which is a bit like maternal caregiving style. We, we spoke about the work with

30:32children, you know, and, and people talk about different attachment styles in children, but that's partly driven by how the carers care for them and that style. We did a similar thing for the owners. If we see high levels on some of the more potentially problematic caregiving styles, so inconsistency, it's perfectly understandable. I'm not here to judge people. You know, if you've got a dog that's trashing the house, you're going to lose your rag with them occasionally, but that, you know, it does have an impact on the dog. So what we tend to do is

31:03we identify where there are issues and we look to try and bring in consistency. We talk about the importance of trying to avoid punishment. Yes. If you're annoyed with your dog, go out in the garden and shriek, but don't do it in front of the dog. Yeah. These sorts of things, um, look to be consistent. Make sure that you're playing with your dog. You know, that's the big way in which dogs form friends and friendships. It's not about giving them treats the whole time. It's about doing things together, synchronizing your behavior. Yeah. And I'm going to pass that baton on to you, Hannah,

31:36because this is what your book's all about. The importance of play with dogs. Can you elaborate on that? Well, basically, I mean, this was written a long time ago because back then I didn't think we talked enough about it and I recognized exactly what we've just been hearing. It's so important in terms of building confidence, resilience, independence. If we're teaching solo play rather than always relying on the owner to chuck the ball or whatever it is, or play tug. Um, and I also think, you know,

32:07there are shared parallels in it with child development in the sense that it does help with emotional regulation, teach social skills, you know, that back and forth type, uh, rhythm of a relationship. And so I think there is the dog appropriate version of that too. And so for me, I think, I mean, you can have all sorts of play, but good play for me is something that supports the dog's confidence, their coordination. It helps get their brain working. So problem solving or can help with

32:39linguistic understanding, you know, so while we're teaching words and attaching that to stuff and asking them to then discriminate, let's say I have a pile of a bunch of toys. It can help teach, uh, spatial awareness. It can help recover after stress or events. So Dan will use the example of, you know, on a walk and there's been a sudden event that's startled, you know, wait for a second to then sort of move over to a toy or, you know, go sniff a lady grass or do something. And so play helps with such a lot of that, but that's why I think it's critical and helps build that secure

33:15a bond with an owner. How would you teach a dog play time's over? Oh, well, basically I personally just go finished or all done and toys go away. So I try and keep it simple. And I liken this to my children. When I used to go to soft play, there comes a point where if I stay just a few more minutes too long, there's going to be tears at bedtime and I'm not going to settle them down. So it's kind of recognizing when are we getting at the point where the turn taking isn't happening or there's less pauses or the play style is a bit more frenetic. And then we need to

33:52recognize, okay, I might deviate and do a find it and get them sort of sniffing and put the toys away. So we do have to recognize when you need to regulate our dog, even if they can't themselves. And is it a good idea to have a consistent end of play signal? You like you said, finished, hands out, that's it now. Yeah. Daniel, what would you say? Yeah, absolutely. And it is really important because it needs to be clear. I do exactly the same, hands up, that's it, all over, all gone, whatever. But then I'll give them something to

34:26entertain themselves. So you can have fun, but I'm done. And again, with play, another important element to it is that reciprocality, you know, we should goof around with our dogs. So, you know, sometimes, yeah, you know, it shouldn't all be one way and us directing. Let the dog sometimes dictate things, you know, and that's absolutely fine. But there's got to be boundaries. Interesting you say that. It was linking it to some questions I saw online again about playing with a

34:59dog and get the dog excited. You know, they very much enjoy that. But around children and small children, what boundaries do you need to have that the dog can still play, but it feels safe around children, or not the dog feels safe, the owner feels safe that their dog can still be around their children? So, I mean, a child should never be left unsupervised with a dog. I don't care how good the dog is, because any dog, you know, can bite a child. Not necessarily because of anything wrong with the dog, the child might poke the dog, you know, and the dog responds. So, it must always be supervised.

35:34But I think actually children playing with dogs is a great opportunity for them to learn. If it's well supervised, I would focus on the child and teach them exercises, all the wonderful things they can do with the dog, teaching them to do things, realize that actually the power of rewards is much better than complaining about the dog, you know. And actually, you help the child's development by doing that. And they can play, you know, they can have a lot of fun. I mean, I said, you know, I'm the youngest of five, my two brothers came first, my two sisters, I was left with the two dogs, that's probably why I'm in the job that I'm in. Because I just

36:07used to play with them. And my mum said to me, I remember Amber, who sort of, I was very close to a Cocker Spaniel. By the age of two, I trained her to do all sorts of stuff. And I was hardly speaking, I should think, at that age, but I had the dogs to play with. Brilliant. Yeah. Hannah, do you get that, you know, people, owners coming to you worried about their dogs around their children? Yeah, absolutely. And in the UK, we're coming into, some schools are already finished for the summer, but most of them finish next week. And actually, that's why next week, I've got

36:38my kids and dogs adventure class to try and, you know, help develop that understanding, but also nurture. It's really important, you know, that we build those lovely bonds and not kind of scaremonger too much, but be sensible. So coming back to your point with babies. So I did some research back in 2010, then I actually did it as my research project for my masters a number of years ago. What happens when the new baby arrives? So I looked at pre and postpartum

37:11dog owning relationships. And what was fascinating is that, sadly, for the dog, whether they love the dog or not, the intensity, I developed like this intensity of attachment scale, it did alter, you know. So my research supported others, which said dog walks lessened. So they were less frequent, or the durations were reduced. Playtime significantly reduced. So easy kind of interactions like giving

37:44treats increased. But what was really powerful was the sheer amount of guilt felt by those owners. They didn't love their dog any less, they just had less time. And so the quality type and frequency of those dog owner interactions were what was screwed, basically. I don't want to make a blanket statement, because you got to take the individual and the individual's relationship. But yeah, there's a million and one takeaways, I could say. But most importantly, they need their own space. So where

38:18children can do like mine, leaping off, screeching and, you know, playing, doing random erratic things, but the dog can be away from that. So they both have their own kind of chill out zones, the kids have a playroom or whatever. Or at least room dividers, if that's not feasible, we need to make sure that the dog can rest in peace, because quality undisturbed sleep is critical. So I like teaching my kids little mantras that are easy to remember. And the other, I need to set the owners, the parents

38:52are sort of reinforcing that. So it's like quiet and slow is the way to go. Really easy. We just teach it when the dog's resting, eating, sleeping, you know, interacting with the toy, and you got to go by quiet and slow is the way to go. And then thirdly, gosh, teaching or getting parents to recognize and also supporting children's ability to spot early signs where the dog saying, not really enjoying this, because a lot of dogs will tolerate with an awful lot, but there'll be a point where enough's

39:24enough. And sadly, again, University of Lincoln, Daniel and his peers, you've done loads of work around dog bites. So I'm going to pass that over to you. But sadly, children are the most common victims typically of dog bites. Yeah, I mean, and it's, it's, it is a problem. And one of the interesting things that's been found is when it comes to reading dogs, it doesn't seem to be just about knowing what to look out for. You actually have to immerse yourself around dogs. This is the

39:54difference between knowing something and having a skill. What's been found is that people who are immersed in dogs, when they analyze dog-dog interactions, they use the same bits of the brain as when they're analyzing human-human interactions. Whereas people who are not immersed in dogs don't. So, you know, they're in effect, they've got these blind spots. They might know what they're supposed to be looking for, but they just won't see it. And they won't interpret it in the same way. So, you know, one of my concerns, yeah, with the dog bites is that people are removing

40:25themselves from dogs. And so they're not getting the experience. They're not, it's not that they, they may have been told what to look for, but you've got to be around dogs if you want to learn to read dogs. And a lot of that is done without us sitting there with pen and paper noting it, you know, it's actually done by the brain, just looking for patterns and saying, you know what, that dog ran off at that point. And the brain is clocking all of this stuff. And that's how we learn to read other animals, is actually by immersing ourself in and working out what our brain does all of that without

40:57bothering to tell us. Yeah, it's an automatic reaction for us. I'm going to come out of that conversation back to a question, which is the second most asked question on the internet, which was, why does my dog lick me so much? Is it love? Is it my taste? Or is it something else entirely? Hannah, what do you think? I'd say it could be all of the above. You know, I always joke to clients saying, until I invent that microphone where I can go, tell me why you're doing what you're doing. Have you not invented that yet? No, but my goodness, wouldn't we be rich if we did? So let's,

41:32let's put our heads together. But anyway, what I would say is there's, gosh, there's multiple reasons. And we, we can only just sort of guess at them, you know, let's say, you know, the person's coming from a jog and they're sweaty, you know, the dog may be sort of fact finding or actually quite like the taste. And that's highly reinforcing. So they keep doing it. And sometimes our chemical scent may change. So if we're pregnant or poorly, perhaps that could be driving some sort of exploratory behavior. Um, you know, maybe it's an attention seeking thing. So for example, um, I've had lots of

42:06situations where people may be, uh, sat down reading or on their phone and the dog's licking them. And so automatically they'll stop what they're doing and pay attention to the dog. So the dog goes, ah, interesting. I'll do that again. Um, and conversely, they might be told off, but it's still some form of attention. So there can be loads of reasons why I'm more concerned if it's excessive or, um, you know, it's then, um, there might be a need that's unmet. So they're trying to tell us something like, can you let me out for a wee or a poo or I'm hungry, frustrated, or, you know, it escalates

42:38from there. So, um, I don't know why they lick. I can only give you various theories as to why it may happen. Yeah. And I would, I'd agree with everything Hannah said, but if you think about it, you know, we've got hands that we can use to stroke dogs. Dogs have got tongues. They haven't got the paws. They're not going to stroke us with their paws. They're going to use their tongue. So it could be like a mutual grooming representation there. So I actually had a client I was chatting to last week and she was saying about her dog licking. And whenever the dog went to the vets,

43:10it would just lick and lick and lick. And it almost certainly was using it just to disrupt what was going on because the vet couldn't do what the vet wanted to do if the dog was constantly trying. So, you know, they will learn these strategies as well. So there's no single reason for any behaviour really. Yeah. Fair enough. Um, Daniel, you've written about the importance of owners teaching their dogs life skills. What do you mean by that? So, you know, traditionally people, especially if they've got a pet with problem behaviour, one of the things they'll commonly say is my

43:43dog won't do what I want when I tell him to do it. And there's a difference between being well-behaved and being obedient. You know, I have to take the example of my two sons. Uh, they're pretty obedient. Um, if we have a meal, you know, they'll put the dishes in the dishwasher. If I ask them, they're pretty well-behaved actually. I don't have to ask them at the end of a meal, they take their dishes and they put them in. I don't want to have to be telling them the whole time. So life skills is really about adapting to our environments and doing the right thing,

44:15making the right decision without having to be asked. So rather than it being obedience-led, i.e. do this, which is, you know, uh, instructional, it says, you know, we get on well when you do these things. Equally, um, so, you know, if, how to greet people appropriately, um, equally, if you're startled, that some startles are good. So you don't become, you don't think that unexpected things necessarily, you don't default to biting in those situations. Um, but equally, if I'm eating food,

44:50um, you just settle down, you don't pester me, you know, those sorts of things. You could, you know, you can train a dog that, you know, I'm eating, please sit down and whatever. I don't have to say that the whole time. I want the dog to know that when I'm sat at the table, I take myself off. I go and find something to entertain myself, you know, and the dog does that. So there, that's what we mean by life skills. So it sounds very idealistic. I'm sure people listening and going, that'd be wonderful if my dog didn't jump up at every stranger on the street because they, you know, as you said, did the right thing without being asked. How do you get to that

45:22point? Um, well, the book's called Life Skills for Puppies. You start at the beginning, um, and you start as you mean to go on. Same with children, you know, it's much easier if you start at the beginning and just set things up and you have these rules and these are the boundaries and they will accept them. They'll absorb them very, very easily. Um, obviously, you know, if things have got out of hand, then we do need professional help in order to support us in order to do that. But that's a lot of what we are often trying to do. We're trying to develop an appropriate relationship

45:56between, uh, the owners and carers and, and their pets. Uh, so I'm going to go into some quick fire questions, um, where you can answer as long as short as you wish to, but they're meant to be obviously sort of quick as you can. And Daniel, I'm going to start with you. I'm going to do all of yours and then I'll move over to Hannah and I'll do yours. So Daniel, are you ready? Okay, here we go. Dogs or cats, which are smarter? Um, I hate that question. Um, everything is smart in its own way. Um, so there's, I just,

46:27you know, everything is adapted to its own ability. So I always tell people the story. Clark's nutcracker has a fantastic memory for space because it has to cash food over winter. Um, so we all have the intelligence we need for our own environment. So it's an impossible question to answer. Very balanced answer. Um, what do dogs do best that we underrate? Observe, I think. Uh, they're very good observers. I think we underrate that and we tend to insert that the dog's thinking about it and therefore sort of put little human brains in them and

47:01therefore blame them for not getting things right. Um, but they're incredibly good observers. Do dogs dream? Absolutely. Um, yeah, yeah. What they dream about, I don't know, but, I certainly get the impression that some of them dream about chasing rabbits and things like that. But yeah, dreaming's part of the way that our brain does stuff.

47:24What's the most over-diagnosed dog problem?

47:29I'd probably say, um, anxiety related to fear when a lot of anxieties are actually related to frustration. I.e. the animal's not sure what they should do or they, they're, so they're in a state of conflict. Whereas fear, the models that we've developed, when we define fear, we mean that there is a threat to the animal's survival when an animal is scared. Now, as humans, we very quickly take any anxiety and turn it into a fear. Um, and we often use the

48:01word fear when we just mean something bad's going to happen. I fear I might lose my house. Well, that's sort of, that's losing a resource. Yeah. Um, in a biological sense, fear means I fear for my life. Um, and so we often take ideas and like things that we're uncertain about and then in effect, that's how we end up worrying. Whereas for cats, dogs, horses, et cetera, they live in that emotional world and they're thinking, I'm not sure what I should do in that

48:33situation. And actually that needs a different approach to treatment to an animal that is very sensitive to threats. Um, if they're sensitive to threats, we have to focus on recalibrating that sensitivity. Whereas if they don't have the control and they're not sure what they should do, we have to focus first on teaching them, this is what you're supposed to do in this situation. And you know, it works. Um, makes sense. Brilliant. Thank you, Daniel. Hannah, are you ready for yours? I'm so glad I didn't get the cat and dog one.

49:06You don't want to make any enemies. Okay. Anna, what's the most underrated training tool in your opinion? Human body language, because they are highly skilled at reading us. So we may say something and our hands may be doing something completely different or our feet or our gaze and the dog's just going, I don't know what you want. What's the best days to start training a puppy? From the day you get your puppy. So life skills, settling, toileting, chewing on appropriate items, knowing that they could be handled and trust that, uh, and recal.

49:39What's one game every dog should be playing? For me, it's scent work, literally just learning to find it, whether it's food, toys, another person or another pet in the home. Really good to get their nose engaged, brain working. And it's, it can be as high of a household as you want or as low. So it's, it's, it's just helpful for busy dogs, worried dogs, puppies, old dogs, you name it. Brilliant. Praise or treats, which is better? Both can matter, but it depends on the individual dog, what motivates them, uh, and what you're trying

50:15to teach them. Um, so I would say it's not a versus, it's what does the dog find reinforcing in that moment?

50:24Finally, the behavior clients panic about most, but shouldn't. Uh, growling, uh, it's useful information tells us the dog's feeling uncomfortable. Something needs to change. So a common mistake is punishing the growl because then the dog learns that's, uh, that's now unsafe to do it. And we've just lost that really important warning signal. Um, so we should never punish a growl, treat it as information and then work out what we need to stop. Um, that was happening in the first place that led to the growl.

50:57Fantastic. I'm just going to finish off with something I call Q&AI, where basically I fed all of the publicly available information I had on both of you into a leading AI agent. And I asked it for the one thing that it would want to ask you if it could. So always a bit odd from a, you know, from an AI perspective, but Daniel, here is your one. I can process every study ever written on dogs, but I'll never have a dog rest its head on my lap. From the outside, that bond looks like the most powerful behavioral technology

51:32on earth. Professor Mills, what is the human dog relationship giving people that an intelligence like me, however capable, can never replicate? Emotional empathy, I should think. Uh, well, uh, yeah, genuine emotional empathy. Um, so people can read stuff into AI, but you know, there is a, yeah, a, a truthfulness in what a dog shows

52:04you. So sorry, AI, you need to work on your empathy. Hannah. Okay. This is your one from the AI. I'm told I'm a very fast learner. No treats required. Honey, if you had to train me, an AI with no body, no nose, and no tail to wag using only your positive science lab methods, where on earth would you even start?

52:32I like the way she said my name. Um, so I start the same way with any learner. So what's the behavior we actually want? What does success look like? Um, and what feedback tells the learner they're on the right track. So with an AI, I'm now going to want to do this. So with an AI, I'm going to give clear feedback, good prompts, examples, clear criteria for success and marking what's working. If they get it wrong, I'd give neutral feedback, specific feedback, maybe reword

53:05the question, narrow the criteria, check the output again against any evidence and ask AI to do it again. And just like dogs, I'm focusing on the behavior. I want more of adapting for the learner rewarding accuracy, transparency, and evidence over AI confidence, which it seems to have a lot of, but not necessarily correct. Does that help? Interestingly, the way you've described that is, is almost exactly how AI has got to the point it has, because AI for a long time didn't work. It just couldn't do what we wanted to do. And then they

53:39introduced behavioral reinforcement learning into the AI engines, almost exactly as you just said it there. Not obviously for praise and things like that, because that doesn't affect it. But for when it comes up with what is a satisfactory, good answer, and they praise it and get forward, and they reinforce that and keep going. That's why we've got the AI we've got today, because of behavioral techniques like you've just described. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Of course. It's learning. It's all learning. Exactly, yeah. Thank you so much, both of you. I think that's all we've got time for. Dr. Mills, or Professor Mills, where can people find out more about your work?

54:12You can find out me through the University of Lincoln website, although I'm about to retire. So after that, I still will have a presence at the university, but I will be setting up my own company, companionanimalconsulting.com. Brilliant. And I'll put that in the show notes so people can look at that as well. Hannah, where can people find out more about you? That's my name. So it's hannahgrice.com, spelled H-A-N-N-E, Grice, although AI would call me Hanni. Hanni, as we just saw, something it can do. And obviously your books, I'll put the links

54:45to the books in the show notes as well. Hanni, I know, Hanni, you've got me doing it now.

54:51It's reinforced me. Yeah, I'm not really real. Yeah. You've also got social media accounts, so I know you're very active within TikTok and on YouTube as well. So I really encourage people to follow you on there. And you've also got clothing, which is really, really nice. Right. So I'm not trying to be like a Philip Green and having an empire. What I would say is the reason why I did that is because the cases, and Daniel probably has similar experiences, the cases can be really emotionally draining that we're working with. So I've always had

55:25an interest in sort of designing in bits and bobs. So it's all aimed at animal owners. Obviously, there's animal things, but it's just, it's a bit of a hobby to give me some breathing space from the day to day. Fair enough. Yeah. And it's really lovely things. I very much like the teen cat tote bag. I'll be getting one of those. I do have a bone to pick with you, pun intended. You've got the male section and the female section and then children's and accessories. You go to the male section and

55:56it's all dog related things. There's no male cat things. I will do better for you, Paul. Thank you. So I will sort that out. If I can get a teen cat t-shirt, that's what I want. Yeah. Yeah. There is a teen cat kid one. So unless you like the kind of cropped up effect, I will sort that out. Yeah, that'd be great. I can be seen in public then. That'd be great. Thank you very much, both of you. Bye. Take care. Bye now. So there we have it. Everything you needed to know about the psychology of dogs and looking

56:27at my pad and what I scribbled down, I've got three main takeaways here amongst all of the wonderful tips that are in the episode. And the first one is no shock, really. Dogs do love us. Brilliant. And whilst the human dog relationship may have started through mutual benefit with dogs being tools that could be used to enhance the camp and our lives and also enhances their life as well, that quickly deepened into a genuine emotional bond shaped by domestication, attachment and cues like mental gaze. And as Daniel said, that oxytocin

57:02release as well. The second point I think I've got here is that dogs are extraordinary readers of human behavior. They pick up on our tone, our body language, our facial expressions. And I even scent, as Hannah was talking about as well, which means they can understand our own stress and our inconsistently, and therefore their behavior can be strongly affected by how we respond to them. So we should be thinking as much about the psychology of a dog owner as

57:33much as the psychology of dog themselves. And finally, I think the good dog relationships are built through safety, play and other clear life skills, as Daniel said. And the practical takeaway here is to focus less on obedience and obedience training for its own sake, and more on helping dogs feel secure, get them to play well, regulate themselves, and learn how to behave appropriately without constant commands. And as Daniel's put it, be able to do the right thing without being asked. That's

58:06the ultimate goal. And in there, Daniel gave tips on how to do that. So I hope you enjoyed the episode. If you're interested in this, and you also have cats, then do check out the previous episode with Dr. Claude Bietta, where we talk about the psychology of cats. It's one of the most listened to episodes I've done so far. And it's certainly one of the most popular on TikTok, which I got over 200,000 views and things like that. So it's really popular. So let's see dogs versus cats on the episode, who's going to win? If you enjoyed the episode or any of the others, please do subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.

58:42It does help. If you can leave a review, that'd be amazing as well, because it helps others know that maybe they should be listening to this as well. And if you have any suggestions for topics you'd like me to focus on, and then I can get academics or relevant people involved, then just email me at paul at everythingpsychology.com. For now, thank you very much for listening. See you next time.