Can Dogs Tell If You’re A Bad Person? The Answer Is Fascinating

by pawbuzz on in Dogs 390

Have you ever noticed that your dog seems to react strangely to certain people?

It’s not uncommon for dog owners to notice that their dogs don’t like particular people, although sometimes it’s unclear why.

Your perfectly well-behaved dog can suddenly start barking angrily at a stranger, or refuse to take a treat from a friend who comes to visit. It’s always surprising, but usually dog owners just write it off as their dog being weird.

Interestingly, there’s actually a scientific reason your dog may randomly act strangely toward certain people — they can tell if someone is a bad person!

If you own a dog, you probably know that they’re pretty intuitive creatures who have good judgment.

The fact that they can tell if someone is a good or bad person may not surprise you, but it’s fascinating to learn more about how researchers tested dogs’ judgment.

If you’ve ever noticed that your dog reacts negatively toward certain people, there’s actually scientific evidence that it may be because they recognize that they’re a bad person.

Researchers tested the hypothesis that dogs can tell if people are being mean to one another.

An article published in Neuroscience and Behavioural Reviews claims that dogs can recognize when someone is being a good person, and are particularly adept at realizing when people are being horrible to one another.

To perform the study, researchers had dog owners act out two separate scenarios while their dogs watched.

In the first scenario, the dog owner struggled to open a container, then asked two researchers to help. One researcher helped, while the other stood by passively.

In the second scenario, the dog owner again struggled with a container and asked for help. One researcher watched passively, but the other actively refused to help.

After both scenarios, researchers offered the dog a treat.

In the first scenario, the dog was just as likely to take a treat from the passive researcher as the helpful researcher.

In the second scenario, however, the dog was much more likely to ignore the treat from the person who was mean to their owner (refused to help).

The researchers concluded that dogs can tell when someone is being mean to another person, then they react accordingly.

So if your dog ever refuses to take a treat from someone for seemingly no reason, they may actually think that they’re a bad person.

Do you think your dog has good intuition and judgment?

If you love learning about dogs, please SHARE this article with your friends and family!

[H/T Country Living]



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390 thoughts on “Can Dogs Tell If You’re A Bad Person? The Answer Is Fascinating”

  4. Cindy Miller

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    My three girls always barked and growled at my neighbor. He was a pervert and harassed my daughter and I. They never saw any of this first hand but they sure hated him. Dogs know…

  12. Don Poole

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    I have two points to make about this….
    1. Good or bad is a judgment call based on past experiences and knowledge of ethics.
    2. Does that mean$#%&!@*s dogs were$#%&!@*s too ?

  34. Geri Larson

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    They know….not just people that are not nice to their owners. Our dog is very intuitive and will stand between me and that person when he does not like someone. Will not warm up to them even if they offer treats or to play ball. He has been right on more than one occasion…trust their instincts, they are very strong.

  35. Shannon Dolan

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    My big teddy bear, Winston, who can look scary, lunged at my idiot neighbor. He is now afraid to come near him. But so are most of the adults in my neighborhood. The kids just want to hug him. He’s super protective.

  44. Denise Pedley

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    My buddy boy hates nearly every one apart from me and my boys! He barks at anyone else who dares try to touch him or say hello to him!!! Think mine is just incredibly grumpy lol

  48. Mike Beernaerts

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    True story: one of my then teenage son’s friends stopped by one day to pick him up and my Siberian got his ears back and growled at this kid.I’d never seen my dog become that menacing to anyone before.
    We came to find out later on that this same kid was beating his girlfriend…nobody knew about it,but my Husky sure as hell did.

  49. Rosa Scott

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    This little experiment does not convince me that dogs are better at percieving a person’s motives any better than people. I would like to know the manner, in which the person who refused to help, did it. Also the body language of the owner after the refusal. Since it was an experiment, the one who refused to help was acting the part. Wanting to be unhelpful was not his true motive.

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