A team of researchers from Japan’s Kyoto University has done a study showing man’s best friend is very quick to spot a liar.
Building on the idea that dogs (who are naturally friendly and trusting) will run to something if a human points at it, the researchers presented 34 pups with three rounds of ‘pointing’.
In the first round, the experimenters pointed to a container that was hiding food for the dogs to find – but in the second round, they pointed to a disappointingly empty one.
For the third, the same experimenter again pointed to the container hiding food – but, amazingly, the dogs’ trust was already broken from the second ‘empty’ round. They didn’t respond.
Researchers say this is because the “socially intelligent” canine participants had realised the human wasn’t reliable and developed “trust issues” which caused them to quickly dismiss their honesty.
The good news? When the ‘lying’ researcher was replaced with someone else, the dogs’ trust automatically returned – their default was to obey the commands of the new person.
Still doesn’t explain why my dog hates the postman though…
