OUR BEST FRIENDS

Many of us share our homes and lives with a canine companion. But how much do we really know about what's going on inside their heads? Cognitive scientists Dr Zazie Todd and Prof Alexandra Horowitz explain what we're learning about how our four-legged friends think, and share a few tips on how you can make their lives better...

- Dr Zazie Todd and Prof Alexandra Horowitz

DOES YOUR DOG REALLY LOVE YOU OR DO THEY JUST LOVE BEING FED BY YOU?

Your dog is so pleased to see you when you get home. Then again, that's also when you feed them. So does your dog see you as their best friend or merely a food delivery system?

You won't find the word 'love' in the published papers of scientists who research non-human animals. Ironically, though, most animal behaviour scientists were drawn to the subject because of their deep and abiding interest in them.

And yet, generations of researchers have been trained not to use anthropomorphic words like 'love' to describe something a non-human animal might be feeling. Indeed, the use of anthropomorphisms (descriptions of non-human behaviour or characteristics with terminology used to describe humans) has long been condemned in the field of animal behaviour. Hence, researchers talk of 'temperament' instead of 'personality' and 'positive cognitive bias' instead of 'optimism'.

This hard-line stance against the applicability of human terms to nonhumans is loosening, however. Partly for the usefulness of some of the terms for describing animal behaviour, but also for the strong evolutionary reasons to believe that non-human animals are not entirely dissimilar to humans.