Dogs prefer to bond with humans who speak to them like babies

SPEAKING to dogs the way parents speak to babies can help owners bond with their pets, scientists have found.

Many pet owners change their voice when talking to their animals, often mirroring the exaggerated, highpitched sounds parents use with their children. Now, scientists at the University of York have found that so-called “dog speak” is important for helping owners bond with their pets.

Dr Katie Slocombe, from the university’s department of psychology, said: “This high-pitched rhythmic speech is common in human interactions with dogs in Western cultures, but there isn’t a great deal known about whether it benefits a dog in the same way that it does a baby.”

Researchers carried out a series of speech tests with adult dogs, where they were given the chance to listen to one person using dog-directed speech containing phrases such as “You’re a good dog,” and “Shall we go for a walk?”, and then another person using adult-directed speech with no dogrelated content, such as, “I went to the cinema last night.”

Attention during the speech was measured and afterwards the dogs were allowed to choose which speaker they wanted to physically interact with. The team found that dogs not only paid more attention to “dog speak”, but were motivated to spend more time with the person who had spoken to them in that way.

Alex Benjamin, a PHD student, said: “When we mixed up the two types of speech and content ... [the results suggested] that adult dogs need to hear dog-relevant words spoken in a high-pitched emotional voice in order to find it relevant.

“We hope this research will be useful for pet owners interacting with their dogs, and also for veterinary professionals and rescue workers.

The research was published in the journal Animal Cognition.