If you follow our Instagram, it’s no secret that I’ve become something of a Frans de Waal fan girl. I first stumbled upon the Dutch ethologist’s work while picking up some holds from our local library, and within the first 100 pages of Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are I’d declared it my new favorite book.
It’s yet to be usurped.
While De Waal is first and foremost a primatologist, his ideas have undoubtedly strengthened my relationship with my cattle dog — and rekindled my childhood fascination with the animal kingdom in general.
Here’s a look at the top three Frans de Waal books I think dog owners should consider reading! (If you’re interested in a broader list of my book recommendations, check out this article.)
1. Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are
I like to joke that this book has become my bible, and I’m only half kidding 😉
What it’s about
De Waal’s discussion of evolutionary cognition offers insights ranging from the number of animals who use tools or practice mental time travel to the value of respecting different types of specialized intelligence and more. It’s full of engaging anecdotes and grounded in reputable research.
How does Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are apply to dog owners?
Fundamentally, this book encouraged me to push past strict behaviorism to see the animals around me less as a mere product of reinforcement or punishment and more as fellow creatures.
This theme meshed well with my passion for play and recent thoughts on hand feeding and inspired an entire article imagining my dog’s “umwelt”.
I really enjoyed Matthew Cobb’s a review of De Waal’s 2016 work. Here’s an excerpt that sums up many of my own feelings:
“De Waal’s holistic and empathetic approach to animals contrasts starkly with the arid dead end of BF Skinner’s behaviourism, which dominated studies of animal behaviour in the second half of the 20th century and banished all talk of feelings or mind, looking instead at learned behavioural responses. If you are at all interested in what it is to be an animal, human or otherwise, you should read this book.”
— Matthew Cobb
Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are details
2. Mama’s Last Hug
What it’s about
As Barbara J. King says, in this book “De Waal firmly puts to rest the stubborn notion that humans alone in the animal kingdom experience a broad array of emotions [through colorful stories and riveting prose].”
How does Mama’s Last Hug apply to dog owners?
One of the most helpful things De Waal talks about in both Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are and Mama’s Last Hug is the balance of anthropomorphism (ascribing human characteristics to non-human animals) and anthropodenial (denying human traits) necessary to really understand the creatures around us.
This book is particularly centered around that theme. As owners it’s easy to look at our dogs, feel connected with them, and believe that they have emotions — and it’s even better to be able to think about how our companions might really experience those emotions and where they come from.
Mama’s Last Hug details
3. The Age of Empathy
What it’s about
While already over a decade old by the time I read it, De Waal’s 2009 work still resonated with me. He discusses his definition of empathy and explores how it comes naturally to a great variety of animals (yes, including us humans).
How does The Age of Empathy apply to dog owners?
I’d say that The Age of Empathy has fewer direct applications to life with dogs than the previously mentioned books. If your primary goal is to think differently about your canine companion, I’d start with Are We Smart Enough and Mama’s Last Hug.
With that said: This work is definitely still impactful. Not only did it help me think more critically about social animals and the drives we develop, it also inspired reflection on the way I interact with my fellow humans (particularly when it comes to stressful dog-ownership events like being charged by off-leash dogs or feeling compelled to judge someone else’s choices).
The Age of Empathy details
We can find value in so many places
Of course Frans de Waal’s books aren’t written explicitly for dog owners like some other titles are. And of course they aren’t perfect — I don’t agree with every sentiment, every extrapolation, every last word. But when it comes to being better for our dogs, there is so much value in opening ourselves up to broader sources of information.
At the end of the day, a primatologist has taught me more about life with my canine than many professional trainers I’ve encountered.
10 comments
[…] Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are: An engaging and funny and critical and still-relevant-a-decade-after-it-was-published exploration of how we look at nonhuman animals… and why our views have been so wrong. (If you’re one of the many enjoying Ed Yong’s An Immense World in the last year, you’ll love Are We Smart Enough too.) […]
[…] Focusing on play has been the singlest best thing we’ve done for our relationship. It enables us to interact as fellow creatures — to embrace the emotions and tendencies we share as social mammals. […]
[…] Focusing on play has been the singlest best thing we’ve done for our bond. It enables us to interact as fellow creatures — to embrace the emotions and tendencies we share as social mammals. […]
[…] best thing we’ve done for our relationship. It enables us to interact as fellow creatures — to embrace the emotions and tendencies we share as social mammals. Cooperative games like fetch are especially great for this […]
[…] single events are often what inspire researchers to devise larger experiments. (My favorite author, Frans de Waal, talks about this at length in his work.) And personal experiences are […]
[…] 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 […]
[…] directly equating the two — it’s important to me to keep a species-appropriate lens and honor each animal in their own context (as opposed to asserting that “human intelligence” is the only metric) — but I do […]
[…] written about anthropomorphism before and especially like how Frans de Waal talks about it in his works. In […]
[…] Frans de Waal (ethologist and author of Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals […]
[…] approach to understanding our dogs’ affection for us echoed some of the traits I love in Frans de Waal (my all-time favorite animal author). Full of research made […]