Dog talk

 

How and why do the dogs talk?

Like humans, pets also communicate with each other or with us, but without speech they are obliged to express their intentions with their body signs, smells and special sounds. Have you known that dogs bark because of the people? And it really makes a difference, when and how is the dog doing this. Dogs understand only a fraction of the human language, according to the researches an average dog knows 20-30 words, but even the most intelligent ones do not know more than 80 either. However, on second thought, we can realize that with these few words, or rather instructions and the appellation of an object, all situations can be solved. Vilmos Csány ethologist presents this in his book entitled Bukfenc mindent tud… (Bukfenc knows everything...) on the basis of a family model, where the husband goes home in the evening and his wife welcomes him. The man only points to different objects (dinner, beer, bed etc.) and with some verbs (Come, Bring it, No, Lay, etc.) is able to direct all the evening, without forming complicated sentences. Certainly, the more complex emotions are omitted from this “dialogue”, depriving the language of its special constructional ability to build up a new, imaginary world in our mind.

 

Dog body language

 

However body language superbly works at identical dogs, it is smooth and rarely ambiguous. According to Vilmos Csány, his dogs are even capable of interpretation. When a new dog came to their family (Jeromos), Bukfenc, who has already known all his owner’s quivers, started to be the interpreter between Csányi and the new dog. Since the puppy did not know the owner's signs Bukfenc taught to him. Csányi observed that at first only Bukfenc paid attention to the instructions, Jeromos closely concentrated on Bukfenc. When the instruction has been said the old dog practically translated, “explained” the situation to the puppy. Later Csányi discovered that the young dog pays less attention to the other one, but rather focuses on the person giving instructions. Csányi notes that sometimes misunderstandings arose; in such cases Jeromos barked with indignation at Bukfenc that “... you said he told me that...” However, as time passed Jeromos has also learned perfectly the rules and did not need interpreter any more.

Dogs learned from people to bark

 

Dogs know about ten sound signals. (Compared to this the cats use almost 100 different ones) Their sound signals are the different variants of growl, yowl, howling and barking. With growl - depending on what kind of sound and with what kind of following body language it is made - dogs may express their insecurity, fear, but their anger and expectations as well. Scientists proved that growl has a stress relieving effect for the dogs. From here comes the saying: “Growls like the dog”. Yowl is usually the sign of pain and fear, but depending on the volume and the altitude of the sound it may signify positive excitement, enthusiasm as well. Howling is the instinctive signal of the dogs. Warning is always used for calling attention. Barking is the “dog’s speech”. Depending on its length and tone, all of them refer to current events and feedbacks, expression for the owner or the environment.

In contrast, the ancestor of the dog, the wolf does not bark at all. According to the assumptions, the explanation for this is that in case of the dogs barking evolved due to human speech. According to Vilmos Csány, the “dogs feel like humans”, from here originates the evolution of barking, which symbolizes speech. In order to support this theory he brings an example of, “when puppies and tame wolf-cubs had to choose between a dog and a man, wolf-cubs chose the dogs without an exception, while the dogs in all case the man. The native ability of most animals is that they recognize their co-species, so I can only interpret this choice in the way that dogs consider men their co-species.”

 

Do foxes bark like the dogs?

In other experiments it was noticeable that foxes raised by humans started to give forth a sound being similar to barking, which likewise can be regarded as speech imitation. Communication is part of our everyday life, and this is true for the animals as well. In many aspects, in the course of the centuries the domestic animals have adapted to the humans environment, learned to live together with the man, accepted the disadvantages of this in exchange for the advantages. Depending on the intelligence of the species they understand human intentions, and if we pay attention to them we can also understand them...

 

 

Oldal: Dog talk
Kennel Tibetan Terrier '' Of Kari Tibetian Shine '' - © 2008 - 2024 - tibetan-terrier.hupont.hu

A HuPont.hu egyszerűvé teszi a weblapkészítés minden lépését! Itt lehetséges a weblapkészítés!

ÁSZF | Adatvédelmi Nyilatkozat