Key Ways My Dog is Not a Furry Little Human

During my time in the dog training & ownership world, I’ve talked a lot about anthropomorphism (ascribing “human” traits to animals, often frowned upon in the dog training community) and anthropodenial (insisting fellow animals can’t share our characteristics, emotions, or experiences at all).

When I first read Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are by Frans de Waal (my all-time favorite book to this day!) I was most struck by his thoughts on when anthropomorphism can be a problem and when it can be helpful.

In the name of striking a productive balance — one rooted in available data rather than “folk nonsense” — I wanted to sum up a few key ways my dog is definitely not just a human wearing a fur coat. Acknowledging these differences has helped me be more thoughtful about our life together.

Table of contents and TLDR Instagram post summary

This article dives into:

• Dogs and people don’t have the same sensory experiences
• We have different physical characteristics
• Canine versus human social norms
• Differences in memory and language

The below Instagram post sums up some key points in a more visual format.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Haley 👩🏼‍💻 + Scout 🐺 (@paws.andreflect)

Differences in dog versus human senses

My dog perceives the world differently than I do. We don’t take in sensory input the same way!

Vision

Humans are a primarily visual species. Dogs, on the other hand, have much poorer vision — it’s blurrier and with diluted colors, akin to a human who experiences red-green color blindness and instead sees many shades of brown and yellow.

Our pets might see slightly better than we do at night, though, and they have greater motion sensitivity.

Hearing

Dogs beat us out in hearing with no real contest. They’re able to pick up on nearly twice as many frequencies as we can (that’s how “silent” dog whistles became a thing) and notice sounds that are four times farther away.

Smell

The low-end estimate is that a dog’s nose is at least 10,000 times more powerful than ours. Many scientists say they “see” through smell the way we “see” through sight.

(Dog Sense and Inside of a Dog have nice, accessible sections on our dogs’ senses.)

Size

The majority of dogs are a lot shorter than us. Things that we view at eye level tower over our pets!

While this might sound trivial to bring up, I think it can help us empathize with a lot of “irrational” fears our dogs might show. I once spent fifteen minutes crawling around the floor at Scout’s level and was shocked at how different things looked.

Dogs and people have different physical characteristics

Dogs (perhaps with a few exceptions 😉) are significantly more agile than we people are. They have four legs, a lower center of gravity, and evolved to chase & scavenge on a variety of terrain.

This affects what types of exercise feel most fulfilling to our companions.

Canine versus human social norms & interactions

People and domestic dogs have coevolved. Our pets are incredible at picking up on many of our cues! That said, canines and humans still differ in natural social behavior, which can create unintended conflict.

Direct eye contact and forward approaches

Humans and canines have different natural greeting behavior. In the primate world, head-on approaches with direct eye contact are completely normal — directly facing someone with tall posture is considered a polite.

In the dog world, on the other hand, direct eye contact can be seen as a threat. (Mutual gaze between pets and owners can release oxytocin, also known as the “love hormone”, but that’s not the case with strangers.) A respectful canine greeting involves approaching in an “arc” from the side, and it’s perfectly normal for a dog to spend some time circling before engaging in physical interaction.

Hugs and physical touch

While some individual dogs might enjoy hugs, on the whole they’re a primate thing. The most similar behavior in the canine world (mounting) doesn’t have the same meaning we humans try to convey with our affection.

Walking speed and bubble of social connectedness

Humans and canines have different natural walking speeds and different thresholds for how far apart we can be from each other before we feel socially disconnected.

Us bipeds walk slower and want to stay close together. Dogs move faster (some trainers estimate their natural gait to be about twice our speed) and are comfortable being much farther away, due in part to their keen senses mentioned above.

Care for objects

This is a particularly interesting relevant in pet ownership. As a person, I understand that I own certain possessions — and I want to take care of those things. My dog, though, doesn’t view our property as inherently valuable in the same way.

If I give Scout a new toy and she proceeds to destroy it — or if she finds one of my shoes to rip apart — she isn’t disrespecting me or the money I spent on her. (She doesn’t even know what money is.) If I buy her a nice elevated bed and she continues to rest on the cheap clothes drying rack in our laundry room (true story) she isn’t being stubborn or rude. If a human guest intentionally broke a treasured trinket, of course I’d be mad, but my dog doesn’t automatically realize the sentimentality.

Don’t get me wrong: Scout absolutely does understand possession in the moment, and possession games are a huge part of our play together! But she doesn’t think about gifts or personal belongings in the same way human society does.

Signs of respect

All in all, we differ on what we find “polite” social behavior. The Other End of the Leash by Patricia McConnell has some great reflections on miscommunications between us and our dogs.

We don’t have the same memory or language processes

How dogs experience time

We don’t fully understand how dogs experience time — but we are learning more about their memories and associations. They seem to have poorer short-term recollection than us and might not have the same level of episodic memory (recalling an exact situation and its surrounding context). That said, they’re especially great at pattern mapping and forming emotional associations with certain stimuli.

Verbal communication

We can absolutely communicate with our dogs — sometimes in very sophisticated, satisfying ways! But canines do not develop the same sort of shared verbal language with us as kids of our own species naturally do. We can verbally explain things like abstract concepts and reasoning to young toddlers more effective way than we can to a dog.

This influences many things in our relationships with them — the tools we use, the importance of reading body language to make fair decisions, and so on.

Ultimately: I want a balanced, accurate understanding of who my dog is

In short: No, of course we shouldn’t willy nilly expect all other creatures to be just like us. But yes, we should use our own experiences to inspire empathy!

While I can never fully get inside my dog’s head (or that of any human I know, really) taking a few minutes to consider how she might interpret a given situation or be affected by a certain environment has done wonders for our relationship.

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A post shared by Haley 👩🏼‍💻 (dog nerd, writer) | Scout 🐺 (@paws.andreflect)

References and related reading

Our own blogs

• Key Ways My Domestic Dog is Not a Wolf
• Imagining My Dog’s Umwelt
• Parallels and Differences Between Human Kids and Dogs

Books and research from experts

• Dog is Love by Clive Wynne
• The Genius of Dogs by Brian Hare and Vanessa Woods
• Animals Make Us Human by Temple Grandin
• Dog Sense by John Bradshaw
• Inside of a Dog by Alexandra Horowitz
• The Other End of the Leash by Patricia McConnell
• David Mech’s wolf research