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Interspecific voice discrimination in dogs
Anna Gábor1,2, Noémi Kaszás3, Ádam Miklósi3,4
1Department of Ethology, Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest, Hungary. annagabor33@gmail.com.
Biologia Futura
|September 23, 2021
Summary
Dogs can recognize their owner
Area of Science:
- Animal Behavior
- Bioacoustics
- Interspecies Communication
Background:
- Vocal recognition is common in many species.
- Limited evidence exists for dogs recognizing owners by voice alone.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate if dogs can identify their owner using only vocal cues.
- To explore interspecific voice recognition in domestic dogs.
Main Methods:
- Dogs participated in a two-way choice task to locate their hidden owner.
- Dogs relied solely on vocal cues from their owner and a control person.
- Correct choices were rewarded with food and praise.
Main Results:
- Dogs significantly preferred their owner's voice over the control person's voice.
- No learning effect was observed across trials.
- Dogs did not exhibit a side preference during the task.
Conclusions:
- Dogs can discriminate between human voices, identifying their owner by vocal cues alone.
- This study opens avenues for researching acoustic parameters in canine voice recognition.
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