Yale expert knows what canines are thinking

NEW HAVEN — Leila Martinez, 8, knows her dog Barry loves her. She knows what his favorites toys are and when he wants to play because he can talk to her, she said.

Leila said Barry understands her words and she knows what he likes because he always gets excited whenever he has his favorite toys. He also knows when Leila needs a friend.

“He comforts me when I’m sad because my mom comforts me when I’m sad and I think maybe he doesn’t want me to be sad and he wants me to be fine and he loves me so he wants me to be comforted,” Leila said. “He has his own moods. Different dogs have their own moods.” Their last dog, Brittany, was shy and “I don’t really know if she loved me or not because she didn’t really come near me and Barry always comes near me and is always playful with me,” she said. Her sister, Nadia, 10, said Barry sits on their laps to tell them he loves them and he talks in other ways.

“He talks with his movement and I can know what he wants and what he’s saying,” Nadia said. “I just point to what I want him to do.”

According to Kathy Shae, owner of Paws ‘N Effect Canine Training Center, dogs like Barry really are communicating with their owners and people can understand if they only observe.

“Dogs communicate in a variety of ways, but mostly through body language, and by their body language I mean everything,” Shae said. “Starting from their ears going right down to the tip of their tail, their general body stature, how they wag their tail, all of that communicates and they’re communicating with us all the time. We as humans just don’t know because we are a verbal species. We need to stop and listen to our dogs by observing them.”

Angie Johnston, a Ph.D. candidate at Yale working at the university’s Canine Cognition Center, provided a glimpse into the canine mind Saturday with a special presentation in honor of Lunarfest and the Chinese Year of the Dog. In her talk, Johnston shed light on what dogs are thinking and how they are able to communicate with people.

“People love their dogs and want to know what they’re thinking, but we can’t ask them,” Johnston said. “The only way we can find out what they’re thinking is by getting these different studies to try to get inside their head.”

By presenting dogs with simple games, researchers at the center learn more about how dogs solve problems and perceive the world, she said. All their studies involve simple problem-solving games that they play with the dogs, and the canine volunteers receive a diploma for participating.

The dog’s relationship with humans began long ago. They are descendents of a species similar to wolves, and about 14,000 years ago, they began going into human camps for food, where they gradually became more and more comfortable around humans, which Johnston said is called self-domestication. The second part of the dog’s evolution happened around 2,000 years ago when humans saw how useful dogs could be and started breeding them, she said.

Researchers have found dogs are sometimes better problem solvers than small children, and that they really do love people, Johnston said. Researchers have looked at hormones released in humans called oxytocin, which they know facilitates bonding and love in a

Peter Hvizdak / Hearst Connecticut Media Leila Martinez, 8, of New Haven, right, gets a kiss from certified therapy dog Sophia, a rescued mixed-breed, on Saturday with her handler Roben River, of Woodbridge, representing dog training facility Paw’s N’ Effect of Hamden.