Here we bring one of those strange studies that makes us reflect on where the research funds are destined in the world. Babies understand what dogs express with their barking, almost like Dolittle doctors, according to research conducted at Brigham Young University in Utah (United States).
During the study, the psychologist Ross Flom and his colleagues showed several six-month-old babies two different photographs of the same dog, one in which he appeared very irritated and another with a friendly appearance.
Subsequently they reproduced the barking sounds of an aggressive and a friendly dog in a random way. To the surprise of the researchers, the little ones always stared at the image corresponding to the bark moments after hearing it.
So that Babies are able to identify the mood of a canine just by hearing it bark, although we do not know if, previously, babies have been exposed to barking and images of dogs. That is, if a baby sees and listens to a dog for the first time, would he also know how to identify his expressions?
We think that, as would happen in the case of a baby not exposed to human expressions and voices, the child would not know how to relate them: this "ability" is acquired in relation to the environment.
Of course, the experiment supported the idea that since, long before learning to speak, Babies can recognize and respond to the tone of human voices and animal sounds. The director of the study highlighted how emotions are one of the first things we learn to recognize in our social environment.
The reason dogs were chosen for this research, conducted in 2009, is that they are highly communicative animals, both in their postures and in their barking. And, why not say it, quite human in that ... Hence they are good playmates for the kids: they already understand each other early.
That's why it's no wonder that, so small, Babies already know what the dog's mood is by its barking, just as they know their parents by the tone of voice.
