Dogs are incredibly sensitive, intuitive animals that we learn more about every day. Recently, it has been discovered that some dogs can alert their owners to seizures before a seizure occurs or notify diabetic owners if their blood sugar levels are low. too low. These greats remain untrained and only some dogs exhibit the behavior. But there’s something all dogs can sense about humans, and they’re pretty amazing.
#1 – Your mood
It’s not surprising that dogs can sense our moods. Dogs often become very tense when we are stressed or angry and they often become clingy if we are upset. In fact, many dog trainers have noticed a difference in the results they get from their dogs depending on the trainer’s mood at the time.
#2 – When you’re not paying attention
Dogs are very intelligent and just like humans, they know when we’re not paying attention. Have you ever noticed that you lost track of your dog in just 10 seconds and that’s when he stole the hamburger on the table? Dogs know exactly when is the right time to make their sneaky moves because they know when we’re not watching, even when we’re standing right there!
#3 – Inequality
A recent study published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences showed that dogs can see inequality right before their eyes. In the study, researchers paired dogs with each other and gave them the same obedience command. They would give one dog a reward while the other got nothing, and quickly discovered that the abandoned dog soon stopped providing the behaviors and would even stop paying attention to the researchers altogether.
#4 – When you’re sick
While many owners can vouch for their dogs to stay close and comfort them when they are sick, it has recently been discovered that dogs can smell cancer cells. The researchers examined the dogs’ noses by having them sniff a variety of blood samples and watching as the dogs pointed to a sample containing cancer cells. Doctors and scientists hope to soon be able to rely on a dog’s smell for better cancer testing.
#5 – If you are unreliable
Japanese researchers at Japan’s Kyoto University studied 34 dogs and published their findings in the journal Animal perception. With the knowledge that dogs would explore an area or object indicated by a human, they wanted to discover how long it would take for dogs to realize that they were being misled by a human, if they did at all. Turns out dogs pick up untrustworthy people pretty quickly. During one round, a tester pointed to a food container inside. In the second round, the container was empty, and in the third round, the food was put inside again. But from following the experimenter to the empty food container in the second round, the dogs learned not to trust them to be rewarded, so they stopped following the tester’s cues. However, when they took another tester out, the dog initially trusted the person until they fooled.
