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Many dogs have a penchant for happily licking their owners’ skin. Now a US researcher has investigated the question of what drives the four-legged friends to this behavior,
US scientists take a closer look at dog behaviour
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Many dog owners know that sometimes their four-legged friends just lick them. Especially if the animals have been alone for a long time or if they haven’t seen their owner in a while. Their tongue is an important organ for dogs to drink and also in temperature regulation. But where does this behavior of licking come from in animals? Is this behavior an expression of affection or is it a remnant of their evolutionary history from wolf to pet? Again other people believe that the salty sweat residues on the human skin cause the animals to this behavior. To follow them behavior of the animals, the US psychologist Stanley Coren had tried in a study to go to the phenomenon on the reason. So the scientist from Stanford University first wanted to get to the bottom of the thesis with the salt.
Scientist makes leak test with dogs
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So for his experiment, Coren invited 20 dog owners and their dogs to participate. The dog owners then had to sprinkle their knees with a salt solution. A timer was then started once the dogs had started licking their master’s knee.
It then came out that the animal licked no more eagerly than usual. Some of the dogs even chose the knee that had not been drizzled with the saline solution at all. Thus it was clearly proved that the dogs had not licked longer at the salty knees than at the unsalted knees. So the salt hypothesis is already off the table.
Expert believes in reenactment of puppy behavior.
Even before the test, Coren had thought it implausible that salt on human skin was relevant to dog licking. After all, dogs’ tongues have few salt receptors. Therefore, Coren had also expected that the taste experience of the dogs would be rather average. Instead, Coren now believes that the dogs’ behavior is based on evolution. For example, puppies would lick food from the mouths of adult animals from an early age. In addition, dog mothers also show their affection by licking the fur of the young animals. Apparently, the dogs then apply this social behavior to their dog owners as well.