Study proves humans understand dog barks

[KurtNYC]

A year or so ago there were stories about how dogs could understand as many as 200 human words. Now comes a study that shows that humans understand the native tongue of canines.

Ethologist Péter Pongrácz, PhD, of Eötvös Loránd University in Hungary, found that human listeners could tell whether a dog in an audio recording was acting aggressive, fearful or playful. The finding suggests, Pongrácz says, that dog barks play a communicative role in canine-human interaction.
...
In his study, Pongrácz worked with Mudis, a Hungarian dog breed. He taped the animals--whose owners all belonged to a Hungarian mudi club--barking in six situations: when a stranger appeared at the door of the dog's house; when a trainer acting as a "bad guy" encouraged the dog to bark aggressively and bite a bandage on his arm; when the dog's owner picked up a leash and prepared to take the dog for a walk; when the dog was left alone in a park tied to a tree; when the owner played a game like tug-of-war with the dog; and when the owner held a ball or favorite toy a few feet in front of the dog.

Then Pongrácz played the recordings for 36 human participants--12 mudi owners, 12 owners of other breeds of dogs and 12 people who didn't own a dog. He found that all participants could correctly categorize the aggressive, playful or fearful emotions of the dogs at levels significantly above chance. He also found that there were no significant differences between the abilities of the mudi owners, other owners and nonowners.
...
Now, Pongrácz says, he and his colleagues plan to investigate how much of the human understanding of dog barks is innate, and how much is learned. As a first step, they're repeating the experiment with 5-year-old children.

http://www.apa.org/monitor/may05/dogs.html

So the dogs are ahead now -- they understand ~200 of our vocalizations, we understand about 3 of theirs.

[Richardo]

1. I know when my dogs see a snake...

...it's a VERY distinctive bark.

[watercolors]

10. same with mt dog

I definetetly know its a snake. we usually go to see if it's a rattler or coral. She has a bark to let us know she wants her chew bone, or wants to play. I guess she has taught us well!

[WI_DEM]

2. I think after 16 years I've also figured out my cat's needs

by the different ways she meows.

[unblock]

4. cats are much easier to understand vocally than dogs

cats are far more expressive, they have many different meows.
dogs only have a very few distinct barks, though they can be more expressive in other ways.

[unblock]

3. our basset hound doesn't bark in any of those situations

she'll whine a bit when left alone, and sometimes also when there's someone at the front door (she does get VERY excited, just not very vocal). she'll also sometimes let out a quite growl when playing tug-of-war.

but mostly she'll only bark when she sees another dog. we understand what she wants by her movements, postures, ear positions, etc.

:shrug:

[DrDebug]

5. I thought he meant that we could understand all barks

But the general emotion is clear. If a dog barks because he is having fun or whether he barks as a sign of aggression is clear as well.

But we still have a Saint Bernard in the neighborhood and he sometimes make a strange bark at me and it's not aggressive, it's more "woof" without any emotion or anything. Still don't know what that bark is about.

[KurtNYC]

7. While searching for that I found this

a more in depth look at dog barks. Pretty interesting.

This link is to a cached page:
http://64.233.187.104/search?q=cache:UFTflLcjKvsJ:www.philosophy-religion.org/dogs/bark.htm+dog+barks+understand&hl=en

[DrDebug]

9. Very interesting

Since that dog is the epitamy of relaxed. He walks slowly often a huge distance behind his owner because he doesn't want to catch up and everything about the Saint Bernard is relaxed and cool, it must be a social contact bark. It is harmonius and slowly walks on afterwards.

[cruadin]

6. I think it would be very hard to understand a strange dog's bark...

without being able to SEE the dog. I get most of my clues as to a dog's mood and message by his posture and body language (as I think dogs do from people) than I do from any specific sound.

[thecai]

8. They Just Now Figured That Out?

My dogs have had different barks for nearly every different circumstance...
I could always tell when the Akita would escape the pen, by the Rott's "tattle-tale" bark.
My dogs have a different bark when humans are walking by, that differs from dogs walking by.
All my dogs have a distinguished bark when they see police or even police cars, (including "unmarked" or "undercover").
They have a different bark for cats, and yet a different bark for neighbors cats.
They have a different bark for UPS, than for the mailman.
I can tell who arrives at my house by the varying barks...

[xultar]

11. DUH...that is what I was thinking too! I know when my dog is barking

to get my attention, when he's alarmed, talking to the pets outside the window etc.

[DS1]

12. I have three responses. Shut. Yo. Mouth.

:grr: