Make friends with any dog

It’s often said dogs are man’s best friend. But they don’t necessarily make friends with every human. Still, a French study shows it can be relatively easy to endear yourself to a dog.

The authors found dogs have a natural tendency to bond with a stranger who walks alongside them for about 15 minutes.

The researchers made this observation after conducting an experiment with about 30 domestic dogs of different breeds and ages.

The scientists fitted each dog with a GPS and let them roam freely in a field for about 15 minutes. Then, the canines were separated into two groups.

The dogs from the first group were accompanied by a researcher, who had to follow the animal, taking care not to stray more than a metre away and to stay side by side.

The pooches in the second group went for a walk in the company of a scientist, but this time the latter was not required to follow the animal.

The academics had to avoid making eye contact or talking to the animal.

For the purposes of this research, published in the journal Applied Animal Behaviour Science, the dogs had no prior knowledge of the person designated to accompany them.

The researchers were then asked to interact for 10 seconds with “their” dogs, before heading off in the opposite direction.

The aim? To see if the animal would spontaneously follow them, or not.

As it turned out, the dogs were more likely to follow the scientists when the latter had been walking alongside them for 15 minutes or so.

They also seemed to be in less of a hurry to return to their master, suggesting they had made friends with their companion.

As a result, the study authors suggest it could be possible to create a certain complicity with an unfamiliar dog, without having to touch or bribe the animal.