How Much Do Dogs Understand About Us?
A reflection on the convergence of our lives with these unforgettable canines.
I woke up from a nap, which oddly involved a dream about bad breath in it, only to see Ottie staring at me from the side of the bed, his eyes just a foot from mine. His tongue hung out of the side of his mouth as he beamed a smile in recognition that I was awake. To be fair, he always smiled: he was a golden retriever.
I said, “You feeling good today, buddy?” And reached my hand over to pet him.
He wagged his tail, seeming to signal, “Yes! Yes, I am!”
“And do you love me as much as I love you?” I said in my sing-songy dog dad voice.
He barked and started wagging his tail. And then it occurred to me — does he even know what I’m saying, like, at all? The inner ego in me wanted to scream, “Of course! He gets you, man!”
In an experiment, I used that same happy, sing-songy voice and said, “Would you like me to take you to the veterinarian and put you to sleep?”
Again, he smiled, barked, and wagged his tail with excitement, with that same dead-pan smile. And I realized my morbid experiment was not proving my point all that well.
Surely, these dogs understand us on some level, right? Ottie was, admittedly, not the brightest dog. He was the runt of his litter and had a very small cranium, which I suspect left little room for cognitive wattage.
So, what exactly do dogs know about us? And how do they get into our psyche so easily?
The nature of k-9 beliefs
To understand what dogs actually think and know, it helps to understand how they came to be at our side.
Per zooarchaeology professor Dr. Angela R. Perri, dogs underwent a form of self-domestication between 27,600 and 17,000 years ago in Siberia, evolving from the gray wolf — which is completely mind-blowing to imagine (a chihuahua and a 180-pound gray wolf are related).
Scientists have debated at length over when the first domesticated dog may have appeared, but they know it happened through evidence of snout shortening, tooth crowding, shorter legs, and changes in skull size.
It likely began when wolves and humans were forced into close confines during harsh winters. Imagine an extra friendly wolf at the edge of the group of humans, showing slightly more curiosity and friendliness, and them tossing him a piece of meat.
Over time, these wolves evolved to be more emotionally available. They learned to recognize human expressions more accurately. They developed new inner eyebrow muscles which allow for more expressive faces, much like humans. They became friendlier and developed a sense of loyalty. And thus, they followed humans as we migrated all over the globe.
What they actually “get”
Dogs operate on an enormous spectrum, just like humans, of intellectual capacity. While Ottie was quite dull cognitively, he was off the charts on character traits and loyalty. For example, when I dropped him off at my in-laws house before a trip, he sat for five hours staring out the window, waiting for us to come back.
Dogs are also wired to recognize both positive and negative emotions in humans and dogs and can demonstrate fascinating emotional intelligence. My late dog, Bogie, got visibly distraught when my then-wife would start crying while watching Grey's Anatomy. Bogie would start pawing at her and be visibly upset, trying to console her. The empathy was fascinating to watch.
Dogs also have a firm understanding and memory of objects, which is why they often know what you mean when you say, “Go get your ball!” This was demonstrated to an extreme with a brilliant Australian shepherd named Chaser. She memorized the names of over a thousand objects, including hundreds of toys. She could pick individual toys out of a giant pile if you just gave her the name.
Chaser was also able to locate a new toy in the pile that she’d never seen by deducing that the name she heard was unfamiliar, and thus, it had to be for the toy she didn’t recognize.
A quick hedge on conclusions
It’s worth remembering that we (humans) sometimes anthropomorphize animals too much, acting like these are humans in animal costumes. This is never more evident than watching footage of a lion exhibit, and people describing lions as he or she, and pappa lion and mama lion, and elaborating on what their motivations are. In reality, these are still wild animals with a completely different modus operandi.
But dogs have converged with us more than wild animals, which makes sense on the evolutionary level. A dog learning human expressiveness, perhaps looking cute while begging, can surely help them get scraps. Yet their transition went further than that.
A dog stood a much better chance of surviving if it developed the full emotional availability, loyalty, and understanding of a human being. It would be much more likely to get food during famines and shelter during a crisis when little room is available.
While a dog may not innately understand the complexities of love, grief, excitement, and other emotions, they are fully attuned to understand when they are present, and even feel the transfer of those emotions upon them.
They feel guilt, as evidenced by studies when dogs broke the rules about eating treats — but not in the way that we think. The dogs obeyed the rule when the owner was in the room, but when the owner was gone, and especially, if the lights were off, they obliged themselves. Then, when confronted by the owner, they began acting guiltily, hanging their heads, averting their gaze, knowing they’d been bad. Yet, they only did this when they were prompted with negative feedback from the owner.
Dogs are also keen on what we know in a situation. In another experiment, an owner sat on one side of the room while the dog sat on the other. A half-transparent wall and a black wall blocked part of the room. A toy sat in front of each half, on the dog's side.
When asked to fetch a ball and bring it to the owner, the dogs almost always chose the toy that was on the transparent side — because the dogs noticed the humans could only see that one.
A dog is constantly taking a pulse of what we are thinking, where we are looking, and what we are feeling. They pay close attention to our eyes and listen very carefully to our words.
Dogs also respond well to tones and energy. This is why they get upset and shake if two owners start arguing or shouting at each other.
Or if you jump up and down and get excited like you just won the lottery, expect your dogs to ramp up and want to party with you —even if they don’t know what the party is for. That’s what makes them amazing. They are always down for a good time — if it involves you.
So, what do dogs know?
Quite a lot. They don’t do math for you. But they’ll understand your general mood, how happy or sad you are, where your focus is.
Some of them can think ahead. My mom’s golden doodle, Dexter, did this brilliant thing before going on walks in Miami during the summer. I’d say, “Go for a walk?”
And he’d immediately get in the pool and swim from one side to the other, get out, and be ready for his leash. Moreover — he knew to wet himself down before the walk so he would stay cool.
Above all, dogs know their love for you. One study showed an increase in tears when a dog was reunited with an owner (which didn’t happen when it was reunited with a less familiar face). This capacity for love can even be leveraged with other species, so long as the dog spends significant time around those species in the first three months of life (herders embed dog puppies with sheep — as they help protect against wolves).
Dogs will learn plenty of words and terms and interlay that knowledge with their feelings for you and your family. There is tons of variety by breed in this capacity.
It’s hard not to let dogs win you over. I’ve had two separate friends who vowed they’d never be fans of dogs. But, inevitably, their spouses got a dog, and in both cases, they were converted.
One recently said, “OK — I get it now.”
As humans, we intrinsically value loyalty, affection, and companionship. And so, evolution, in its peculiar and magical ways, said, “Say no more.”
Dogs don’t know everything. But they know and feel more than enough to make awesome companions.
I'm a former financial analyst turned writer out of Tampa, Florida. I write story-driven content to help us live better and maximize our potential.