We've inherited my nother-in-law's dog, Tea Sea, a sweet 11-year-old Shih Tsu. I'm more of a cat person myself; we've had cats ever since we moved here. But I've quite fallen for the little thing; she really is quite loveable.
So I found this article quite interesting. It seems that dogs have evolved to invoke that loving response in humans.
Most pet owners probably know what it’s like to cave to those “puppy dog” eyes—no matter the age of their canine. When your dog looks at you with that curled brow and doleful stare, it’s difficult not to give it a loving scratch or meaty treat. And why not: You and your furry friend have been conditioned by thousands of years of evolution for this moment, according to a growing body of research by biological anthropologists like Anne Burrows.
“Dogs are our closest companions,” she says. “They’re not closely related to us [as a species], but they live with us, they work with us, they take care of our children and our homes. So investigating different aspects of the dog-human bond, I thought, would help me understand human evolution and human origins.”
From disarming looks to alarming barks, Burrows and her team at Duquesne University in Pittsburgh investigate the ways dogs have evolved to express themselves in order to earn the title of “man’s best friend.” The research group is taking a detailed anatomical approach to understand how dogs and their wild relatives, wolves, evolved to have different traits, such as facial expressions and vocalizations. Burrows presented preliminary data from the lab’s latest canine facial-muscle studies at the American Association for Anatomy annual meeting in Philadelphia on April 5. These traits are also little windows into the evolutionary history of both dogs and humans.
“The story of dogs is the story of humans,” she says. “It helps us understand how we got here, and what we were doing in terms of technology, social behavior, over thousands of years.”
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