Inside of a Dog_ What Dogs See, Smell, and Know - Alexandra Horowitz [142]
Genetic analysis tests have become available since the mapping of the genome: for a fee, companies will allegedly resolve your dog's genetic code, determined from a blood sample or swab of cheek cells, into its contributing breeds. At present the accuracy of the tests is indeterminate.
What is considered aggressive is culturally and generationally relative. German shepherds were on the top of the list after World War II; in the 1990s Rottweilers and Dobermans were scorned; the American Staffordshire terrier (also known as the pit bull) is the current bête noire. Their classification has more to do with recent events and public perception than with their intrinsic nature. Recent research found that of all breeds, dachshunds were the most aggressive to both their own owners and to strangers. Perhaps this is underreported because a snarling dachshund can be picked up and stashed away in a tote bag.
Not only do dogs not typically hunt to feed themselves—whether encouraged to or not—but what hunting technique they have is, it has been noted, "sloppy." A wolf makes a calm, steady track toward his prey, without any frivolous moves; untrained dogs' hunting walks are herky-jerky, meandering back and forth, speeding and slowing. Worse, they may get waylaid by distracting sounds or a sudden urge to playfully pursue a falling leaf. Wolves' tracks reveal their intent. Dogs have lost this intent; we have replaced it with ourselves.
Notably, the number of behavioral similarities between chimpanzees and humans (culture and language aside for the moment) increases steadily as the number of scientific studies of the chimps also steadily increases.
… theoretically: no swimming pools have been used in such a test. Instead, experimenters use extremely small samples of an odorless medium, and then add an even more extremely small sample of sugar to one of them.
The psychologist Martha McClintock was the first to seriously study pheromone detection in humans; she and others have done savvy, fascinating studies of how our behavior and hormonal rates may be affected by pheromones or pheromone-like hormones. But the jury is still out—and loudly arguing—on these claims.
This construction—strange dog—itself seems geared to inspire fear. Its use is also based on a flawed premise: that familiar dogs will behave predictably and reliably, and unfamiliar ones will not. As we've seen, as much as we may want dogs to behave in lockstep with our desires, their simply being their own animals ensures that they will not always do so.
Research on other diseases is proceeding apace. Provocatively, dogs who live in homes with epileptics seem to be moderately good predictors of seizures. Two studies report that dogs licked the person's face or hands, whimpered, stood nearby, or moved protectively—in one case sitting on a child, and in another blocking a child's access to stairs—before seizures. If this is true, there may be olfactory, visual, or some other invisible (to us) cues that the dogs used. But as the data come from "self-report"—family questionnaires rather than data gathered more objectively—more evidence is needed. We can however, pause in admiration of the possibility of such a skill.
In reality, few people hear equally well across this spectrum. With age, the higher-frequency sounds, above 11–14 kilohertz, go undetected by the human ear. This knowledge prompted the inspired design of a product with the teenager's umwelt in mind. The device emits a 17 kilohertz tone—out of the range of most adults' hearing, but unpleasantly audible to youngsters. Shop owners have used it as a teenager repellent, to discourage loitering