Bodily emotional expressions are a primary source of information for dogs, but not for humans

Dogs have remarkable abilities to synergise their behaviour with that of people, but how dogs read facial and bodily emotional cues in comparison to humans remains unclear. Both species share the same ecological niche, are highly social and expressive, making them an ideal comparative model for intra- and inter-species emotion perception. We compared eye-tracking data from unrestrained humans and dogs when viewing dynamic and naturalistic emotional expressions in humans and dogs. Dogs attended more to the body than the head of human and dog figures, unlike humans who focused more on the head of both species. Dogs and humans also showed a clear age effect that reduced head gaze. Our results indicate a species-specific evolutionary adaptation for emotion perception, which is only partly modified for heterospecific cues. These results have important implications for managing the risk associated with human-dog interactions, where expressive and perceptual differences are crucial.

Automated summary

Dogs and humans have species-specific differences in emotion perception, with dogs focusing more on the body while humans focus more on the head when viewing emotional expressions. Both species also show a clear age effect, with reduced head gaze as they age. These findings have important implications for managing interactions between humans and dogs.