Surprise! Your Dog Can Tell If You Are Happy Or Angry

While every dog owner knows that their pooch can discern their moods perfectly, scientists have always been a little skeptical. Now thanks to some researchers at the University of Veterinary Medicine in Vienna, Austria, we finally have some tangible evidence.

For their study, biologist Corsin Müller and his team selected eleven dogs, including nine Border Collies, a Fox Terrier, and a Sheltie. They began by exposing the dogs to digital images of women that were either angry or happy. Half the dogs were rewarded for touching the screen when shown a happy face, while the other half got their treat for selecting those that appeared angry.

What was interesting was the pooches were not provided with the entire face. Some dogs were shown only upper halves while others observed lower halves. That's because the scientists who published their findings in the journal Current Biology on February 12th, believe that humans show their emotions on their entire face. Hence by exposing them to just partial expressions the researchers were teaching the dogs to recognize small nuances like the wrinkle between the eyes or the changes in their shape that accompany the happy or angry expressions.

While the dogs were able to grasp both emotions, the researchers found that those being trained to read angry expressions took longer to learn. They speculate it may be because dogs find angry faces aversive, causing them to retreat quickly.

Given the close bond between dogs and their owners, most researchers are not surprised at the findings of the study. The one thing they are not sure of is how this expression discerning ability is affected if the dog does not have close human contact. And in case you are wondering, the team does plan on conducting similar studies on cats and even pigs and hand-raised wolves. So stay tuned to see if your beloved pet is as smart as dogs are!