They’re often referred to as ‘man’s best friend’.
But as any dog owner will know, catching your pet’s attention isn’t always easy.
Thankfully, the days of desperately trying to cajole your pet are a thing of the past.
Vets have revealed a surprisingly simple method that is guaranteed to make your dog do want you want every time.
The team from the University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna strapped eye-tracking helmets to dogs to test various methods.
Their analysis revealed that staring at an obejct or pointing at it are ‘useful’ tactics.
However, they found that combining these two gestures is the best way to get your pet to follow your directions.
‘The joint use of pointing and gazing is a particularly effective method for directing dogs’ attention to a referent,’ the researchers said.
Vets have revealed a surprisingly simple method that is guaranteed to make your dog do want you want every time
The team strapped eye-tracking helmets to dogs to test various methods. Their analysis revealed that staring at an obejct or pointing at it are ‘useful’ tactics. However, they found that combining these two gestures is the best way to get your pet to follow your directions
In humans, ‘referential communication’ is a key aspect of cooperation.
However, until now, there has been little reseach into referential communication between humans and their pets.
‘In the current study, we set out to investigate whether dogs follow humans’ referential communication more than their other directional cues,’ the researchers wrote in their study, published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B.
The team enlisted 20 dogs across a range of breeds, including mongrels, Staffordshire terriers, Australian shepherds, and poodles.
Each dog was given an eye-tracking helmet, before facing a scientist on their knees.
A bowl was placed on either side of the scientists – but only one contained a hidden treat.
The dogs were presented with five different scenarios, six times each.
The scientists would point at the bowl while staring at the dog, or point and look at the bowl at the same time, or look only at the bowl.
They even used the classic prank that many dog owners play on their pets, pretending to throw a ball in the direction of the bowl, while really keeping it in their hand.
The footage collected from the helmets showed that the dogs fared best when the scientist both pointed and stared at the bowl that contained the treat.
‘In pointing + gazing, dogs maintained longer attention on the referent compared with other conditions and they approached it significantly above chance levels,’ the researchers said.
In contrast, they did the worst when the scientists pretended to throw the ball.
‘While the alternative cue (fake throwing) moved the dogs’ gaze to the indicated direction, it did not increase the frequency of gaze shifts to the precise referent location,’ the experts added.
The researchers now hope to replicate the study with a wider range of dogs.
‘We know that dogs with varying levels of exposure to humans perform worse than pet dogs in studies of pointing comprehension,’ they added.
‘It would be interesting to examine whether such differences are also found in their gaze following in response to human referential communication or whether their attention is similar even though it does not translate into choice performance.’
