Reuters reports that a British study has found that dogs find human yawns contagious. British scientists believe this may mean dogs have a "rudimentary capacity for empathy."
Dogs find human yawns contagious, suggesting they have a rudimentary capacity for empathy, British scientists said on Wednesday.
Although yawning is widespread in many animals, contagious yawning — a yawn triggered by seeing others yawning — has previously only been shown to occur in humans and chimpanzees.
It turns out, however, that man's best friend is highly sensitive to catching human yawns, with 72 percent of 29 dogs tested yawning after observing a person doing so.
The BBC also has an article about they study and they talked to the head of the study Dr. Atsushi Senju.
"Dogs have a very special capacity to read human communication. They respond when we point and when we signal," Dr Senju told BBC News.
The researchers explained that along with floppy ears and big soppy-eyes, humans have selected dogs to be obedient and docile. The results from this study suggest the capacity for empathy towards humans is another trait selected in dogs during domestication.
Dr Senju thinks that these traits would have been useful to humans when they began to live side-by-side with canines approximately 15,000 years ago.
There are many pet owners that could probably have told the scientists that their dogs yawn after they do and vice versa but the scientific study does offer some scientific proof. Some cat owners might even say that cats know what it means when their human is yawning and looking sleepy but this study was about the dogs.
