What exactly is going on behind those big, brown eyes?
No doubt everyone who has lived with a dog will be familiar with the scenario: you’re cooking, reading a book, or otherwise minding your business when you look up to see your pup staring at you from across the room with longing eyes.
It’s a common behaviour that can be puzzling at times. But why does it happen? Just what is going through your dog’s mind?
It’s a story with a surprisingly long history. In fact, it turns out that investigating the reasons that our dogs watch us so intently was top of the list when researchers first delved into canine psychology several decades ago.
“One of the first discoveries in dog cognition research that led to a lot of future studies is that dogs will look us in the eyes and at our faces in a way that’s very unusual for animals,” says Alexandra Horowitz, a professor of canine cognition based at Barnard College, Columbia University, New York.
“It’s not that no other animals do this, but most animals use staring as a threat display. Wolves, for instance, will stare down an unknown wolf, maybe to avoid a conflict.”
Why does my dog stare at me?
The most straightforward explanation as to why your pet pooch might be giving you the eye is simply that they are looking to you, as their owner, for cues on how they should behave and what they should be doing.
“You control their world. Dogs are, and I don’t want to put too fine a point on this, captive to us for the most part,” says Horowitz.
“We designate when they eat, when they can go out and socialise and sniff the world, and where they can urinate and defecate. We’re in control of all of the things that they want to do, and they want to see when that’s going to happen.”
However, the behaviour is linked to something deeper: studies have shown that dogs’ ability to interpret our feelings and desires is so finely tuned that they are able to distinguish emotional facial expressions from neutral expressions and happy faces from angry ones – even if they are only shown photographs of faces.
The ability is likely due to the intimate bond that humans and dogs have evolved over thousands of years of living together.
“Humans use gazing at each other as an intimate gesture. It’s something you do with people you’re friendly with. It’s also used for communication – you get somebody’s attention by looking at them and you hold their gaze when speaking to them,” says Horowitz.
“We find it very appealing, and somewhere along the way we either selected dogs that will look at our faces – or dogs selected themselves in some way.
“We think this indicates they are interested in us and that they understand us. But at minimum they’re looking for information from us and they know that our faces are the source of a lot of that.”
So, next time you find your pup gazing intently at you, don’t worry, it’s perfectly natural. They are likely just trying to figure out what you are doing and how to be a part of it. What good boys and girls.
About our expert, Prof Alexandra Horowitz
Alexandra is a professor of canine cognition based at Barnard College, Columbia University, New York.
Her work has been published in the academic journals Animal Cognition, Learning And Behaviour and the Official Journal Of The Society For Neuroscience.
She is also the author of the books Inside Of A Dog – What Dogs See, Smell And Know and The Year Of The Puppy.
Read more about the science of dogs:
- Puppy love: How science explains our special bond with dogs
- Why your brain thinks this puppy is undoubtedly cuter than a baby
- No, Bunny the talking dog can’t really speak English, but here’s how you can learn to speak dog