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Author |
Miklósi, Á.; Soproni, K. |
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Title |
A comparative analysis of animals' understanding of the human pointing gesture |
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Journal Article |
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Year |
2006 |
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Animal cognition |
Abbreviated Journal |
Anim. Cogn. |
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9 |
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2 |
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81-93 |
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*Animal Communication; Animals; *Behavior, Animal; Child; Child, Preschool; Dogs; Fixation, Ocular; *Gestures; Hand; Humans; *Nonverbal Communication; Pinnipedia; Primates; Problem Solving; *Recognition (Psychology); Species Specificity |
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We review studies demonstrating the ability of some animals to understand the human pointing gesture. We present a 3-step analysis of the topic. (1) We compare and evaluate current experimental methods (2) We compare available experimental results on performance of different species and investigate the interaction of species differences and other independent variables (3) We evaluate how our present understanding of pointing comprehension answers questions about function, evolution and mechanisms. Recently, a number of different hypotheses have been put forward to account for the presence of this ability in some species and for the lack of such comprehension in others. In our view, there is no convincing evidence for the assumption that the competitive lifestyles of apes would inhibit the utilization of this human gesture. Similarly, domestication as a special evolutionary factor in the case of some species falls short in explaining high levels of pointing comprehension in some non-domestic species. We also disagree with the simplistic view of describing the phenomenon as a simple form of conditioning. We suggest that a more systematic comparative research is needed to understand the emerging communicative representational abilities in animals that provide the background for comprehending the human pointing gesture. |
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Department of Ethology, Eotvos Lorand University, Budapest, Pazmany P 1/c, H-1117, Budapest, Hungary. miklosa@ludens.elte.hu |
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1435-9448 |
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PMID:16235075 |
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refbase @ user @ |
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463 |
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Virányi, Z.; Topál, J.; Miklósi, Á.; Csányi, V. |
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Title |
A nonverbal test of knowledge attribution: a comparative study on dogs and children |
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Journal Article |
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Year |
2006 |
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Animal Cognition |
Abbreviated Journal |
Anim. Cogn. |
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9 |
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1 |
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13-26 |
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Animals; *Child Psychology; Child, Preschool; Cues; Dogs/*psychology; Female; Humans; Male; Nonverbal Communication; *Problem Solving; Species Specificity |
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The sensitivity of eleven pet dogs and eleven 2.5-year-old children to others' past perceptual access was tested for object-specificity in a playful, nonverbal task in which a human Helper's knowledge state regarding the whereabouts of a hidden toy and a stick (a tool necessary for getting the out-of-reach toy) was systematically manipulated. In the four experimental conditions the Helper either participated or was absent during hiding of the toy and the stick and therefore she knew the place(s) of (1) both the toy and the stick, (2) only the toy, (3) only the stick or (4) neither of them. The subjects observed the hiding processes, but they could not reach the objects, so they had to involve the Helper to retrieve the toy. The dogs were more inclined to signal the place of the toy in each condition and indicated the location of the stick only sporadically. However the children signalled both the location of the toy and that of the stick in those situations when the Helper had similar knowledge regarding the whereabouts of them (i.e. knew or ignored both of them), and in those conditions in which the Helper was ignorant of the whereabouts of only one object the children indicated the place of this object more often than that of the known one. At the same time however, both dogs and children signalled the place of the toy more frequently if the Helper had been absent during toy-hiding compared to those conditions when she had participated in the hiding. Although this behaviour appears to correspond with the Helper's knowledge state, even the subtle distinction made by the children can be interpreted without a casual understanding of knowledge-formation in others. |
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Department of Ethology, ELTE University Budapest, Pazmany P. setany 1/C H-1117, Hungary. zsofi.viranyi@freemail.hu |
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PMID:15895261 |
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Equine Behaviour @ team @ |
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2486 |
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Miklósi, Á.; Kubinyi, E.; Topál, J.; Gácsi, M.; Virányi, Z.; Csányi, V. |
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A Simple Reason for a Big Difference: Wolves Do Not Look Back at Humans, but Dogs Do |
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2003 |
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Current Biology |
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13 |
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9 |
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763-766 |
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The present investigations were undertaken to compare interspecific communicative abilities of dogs and wolves, which were socialized to humans at comparable levels. The first study demonstrated that socialized wolves were able to locate the place of hidden food indicated by the touching and, to some extent, pointing cues provided by the familiar human experimenter, but their performance remained inferior to that of dogs. In the second study, we have found that, after undergoing training to solve a simple manipulation task, dogs that are faced with an insoluble version of the same problem look/gaze at the human, while socialized wolves do not. Based on these observations, we suggest that the key difference between dog and wolf behavior is the dogs' ability to look at the human's face. Since looking behavior has an important function in initializing and maintaining communicative interaction in human communication systems, we suppose that by positive feedback processes (both evolutionary and ontogenetically) the readiness of dogs to look at the human face has lead to complex forms of dog-human communication that cannot be achieved in wolves even after extended socialization. |
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0960-9822 |
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Equine Behaviour @ team @ |
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4966 |
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Gácsi, M.; Miklósi, Á.; Varga, O.; Topál, J.; Csányi, V. |
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Title |
Are readers of our face readers of our minds? Dogs (Canis familiaris) show situation-dependent recognition of human's attention |
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Journal Article |
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Year |
2004 |
Publication |
Animal Cognition |
Abbreviated Journal |
Anim. Cogn. |
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7 |
Issue |
3 |
Pages |
144-153 |
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Animals; Association Learning; *Attention; Bonding, Human-Pet; Cognition; *Concept Formation; Cues; Dogs/*psychology; *Facial Expression; Female; Humans; Male; *Nonverbal Communication; *Recognition (Psychology); Social Behavior |
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The ability of animals to use behavioral/facial cues in detection of human attention has been widely investigated. In this test series we studied the ability of dogs to recognize human attention in different experimental situations (ball-fetching game, fetching objects on command, begging from humans). The attentional state of the humans was varied along two variables: (1) facing versus not facing the dog; (2) visible versus non-visible eyes. In the first set of experiments (fetching) the owners were told to take up different body positions (facing or not facing the dog) and to either cover or not cover their eyes with a blindfold. In the second set of experiments (begging) dogs had to choose between two eating humans based on either the visibility of the eyes or direction of the face. Our results show that the efficiency of dogs to discriminate between “attentive” and “inattentive” humans depended on the context of the test, but they could rely on the orientation of the body, the orientation of the head and the visibility of the eyes. With the exception of the fetching-game situation, they brought the object to the front of the human (even if he/she turned his/her back towards the dog), and preferentially begged from the facing (or seeing) human. There were also indications that dogs were sensitive to the visibility of the eyes because they showed increased hesitative behavior when approaching a blindfolded owner, and they also preferred to beg from the person with visible eyes. We conclude that dogs are able to rely on the same set of human facial cues for detection of attention, which form the behavioral basis of understanding attention in humans. Showing the ability of recognizing human attention across different situations dogs proved to be more flexible than chimpanzees investigated in similar circumstances. |
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Comparative Ethology Research Group, Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Pazmany P. 1/c., 1117, Budapest, Hungary. gm.art@axelero.hu |
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1435-9448 |
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PMID:14669075 |
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Equine Behaviour @ team @ |
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2547 |
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Maros, K.; Dóka, A.; Miklósi, Á. |
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Behavioural correlation of heart rate changes in family dogs |
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Journal Article |
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2008 |
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Applied Animal Behaviour Science |
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Appl. Anim. Behav. Sci. |
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109 |
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2 |
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329-341 |
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Fourteen dogs (7 males and 7 females) were tested for their heart rate (HR) and heart rate variability (HRV) responses in different activities and environmental challenges while their movement was controlled. First, we wanted to compare the dogs? cardiac responses in different body positions (lying, sitting and standing) and during slow walking to reveal their possible influence on HR and HRV. Second, we tested the HR response during an attentive state when the dog was gazing at its favourite toy while remaining in a steady body position. Finally we investigated the heart activity during separation from the owner. We also analysed the individual differences and the influence of gender on the heart responses. We found that the HR increased during periods of increased activity (walking) and was lowest during lying, while it did not differ between sitting and standing. At the same time no changes in HRV were found in the case of different body positions and walking. In contrast, HRV significantly increased when dogs oriented towards their favourite toy, and we found a distinct individual characteristic HR change in this situation compared to the similar body position without the toy being shown. Interestingly during separation from the owner the HR did not increase, but when a strange person was petting the dog, a significant increasing effect was seen in the HR. However the HRV increased only when the petting was discontinued. In general, large individual variation was found with regard to the HR and HRV, while gender did not influence the cardiac activity of the dogs.These results show that body position affected HR significantly in dogs. Further it seems that HRV could be a good indicator of the dog's attentive state. Thus in future studies both the physical and cognitive factors should be given more attention when HR or HRV is investigated as a dependent variable. |
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Elsevier |
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doi: 10.1016/j.applanim.2007.03.005 |
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Equine Behaviour @ team @ |
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5846 |
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Miklósi, Á. |
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Cecilia Heyes and Ludwig Huber (eds): The Evolution of Cognition |
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2002 |
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Animal Cognition |
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Anim. Cogn. |
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5 |
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3 |
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187-189 |
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Equine Behaviour @ team @ |
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3096 |
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Miklósi, Á.; Topál, J.; Csányi, V. |
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Title |
Comparative social cognition: what can dogs teach us? |
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Journal Article |
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2004 |
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Animal Behaviour. |
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Anim. Behav. |
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67 |
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6 |
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995-1004 |
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Research in comparative social cognition addresses how challenges of social living have formed the cognitive structures that control behaviours involved in communication, social learning and social understanding. In contrast to the traditional psychological approach, recent investigations take both evolutionary and functional questions into account, but the main emphasis is still on the mechanisms of behaviour. Although in traditional research `comparative' meant mainly comparisons between humans and other primates, ethological influences have led to a broadening of the spectrum of species under study. In this review, we evaluated how the study of dogs broadens our understanding of comparative social cognition. In the early days of ethology, dogs enjoyed considerable interest from ethologists, but during the last 20 years, dogs have rarely been studied by ethological methods. Through a complex evolutionary process, dogs became adapted for living in human society; therefore, the human environment and social setting now represents a natural ecological niche for this species. We have evidence that dogs have been selected for adaptations to human social life, and that these adaptations have led to marked changes in their communicative, social, cooperative and attachment behaviours towards humans. Until now, the study of dogs was hindered by the view that they represent an `artificial' species, but by accepting that dogs are adapted to their niche, as are other `natural' species, comparative investigations can be put into new light. |
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refbase @ user @ |
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406 |
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Maros, K.; Gácsi, M.; Miklósi, Á |
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Comprehension of human pointing gestures in horses ( Equus caballus ) |
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Journal Article |
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2008 |
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Animal Cognition |
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Anim. Cogn. |
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11 |
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3 |
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457-466 |
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Human-animal communication – Pointing – Horse |
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Abstract Twenty domestic horses (Equus caballus) were tested for their ability to rely on different human gesticular cues in a two-way object choice task. An experimenter hid food under one of two bowls and after baiting, indicated the location of the food to the subjects by using one of four different cues. Horses could locate the hidden reward on the basis of the distal dynamic-sustained, proximal momentary and proximal dynamic-sustained pointing gestures but failed to perform above chance level when the experimenter performed a distal momentary pointing gesture. The results revealed that horses could rely spontaneously on those cues that could have a stimulus or local enhancement effect, but the possible comprehension of the distal momentary pointing remained unclear. The results are discussed with reference to the involvement of various factors such as predisposition to read human visual cues, the effect of domestication and extensive social experience and the nature of the gesture used by the experimenter in comparative investigations. |
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Equine Behaviour @ team @ |
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4388 |
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Kubinyi, E.; Topál, J.; Miklósi, Á.; Csányi, V. |
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Dogs (Canis familiaris) learn their owners via observation in a manipulation task. |
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2003 |
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Journal of Comparative Psychology |
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J. Comp. Psychol. |
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117 |
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2 |
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156-165 |
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Eighty-seven pet dogs (Canis familiaris) were involved in an experiment in which they had to solve a task to obtain a ball. After witnessing a full demonstration by their owner (10 times pushing the handle of the box, which released a ball), most dogs preferred to touch the handle sooner and more frequently in comparison with other parts of the box, and they used the handle to get the ball. In contrast dogs in 3 control groups developed their own respective methods. The lack of emergence of the ball and playing after the demonstration did not affect the learning performance strongly. This suggests that in dogs the outcome of a demonstration plays only a restricted role in the manifestation of social learning. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved) |
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Equine Behaviour @ team @ |
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Virányi, Z.; Topál, J.; Gácsi, M.; Miklósi, Á.; Csányi, V. |
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Dogs respond appropriately to cues of humans' attentional focus |
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2004 |
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Behavioural Processes |
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Behav. Process. |
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66 |
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2 |
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161-172 |
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Animals; *Attention; Bonding, Human-Pet; Communication; *Cues; Dogs; Humans; Recognition (Psychology) |
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Dogs' ability to recognise cues of human visual attention was studied in different experiments. Study 1 was designed to test the dogs' responsiveness to their owner's tape-recorded verbal commands (Down!) while the Instructor (who was the owner of the dog) was facing either the dog or a human partner or none of them, or was visually separated from the dog. Results show that dogs were more ready to follow the command if the Instructor attended them during instruction compared to situations when the Instructor faced the human partner or was out of sight of the dog. Importantly, however, dogs showed intermediate performance when the Instructor was orienting into 'empty space' during the re-played verbal commands. This suggests that dogs are able to differentiate the focus of human attention. In Study 2 the same dogs were offered the possibility to beg for food from two unfamiliar humans whose visual attention (i.e. facing the dog or turning away) was systematically varied. The dogs' preference for choosing the attentive person shows that dogs are capable of using visual cues of attention to evaluate the human actors' responsiveness to solicit food-sharing. The dogs' ability to understand the communicatory nature of the situations is discussed in terms of their social cognitive skills and unique evolutionary history. |
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Department of Ethology, Eotvos Lorand University, Budapest, Hungary. zsofi.viranyi@freemail.hu |
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0376-6357 |
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PMID:15110918 |
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Equine Behaviour @ team @ |
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4957 |
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