The neuropeptide oxytocin (OT) attracts the interest of neuroscientists, psychologists, and
psychiatrists due to its capacity to modulate emotional and social behavior. Although much …

Simple Summary In several species, facial expressions have been associated with positive
and negative emotions to communicate their mental state. In dogs, the interpretation of these …

Behavioural studies revealed that the dog–human relationship resembles the human mother–
child bond, but the underlying mechanisms remain unclear. Here, we report the results of a …

Previous research on human infants has shown that violations of basic physical regularities
can stimulate exploration, which may represent a type of hypothesis testing aimed at …

Facial expressions are a core component of the emotional response of social mammals. In
contrast to Darwin's original proposition, expressive facial cues of emotion appear to have …

Most studies on dogs' cognitive skills in understanding human communication have been
conducted on pet dogs, making them a role model for the species. However, pet dogs are …

The social distancing required during Covid-19 times tended to make people feel lonelier
than usual. Those with pets might, however, have experienced this less, because pets are …

One of the most productive behavioural domains to study visual communication in mammals
is social play. The ability to manage play–fighting interactions can favour the development of …

Contact causality is one of the fundamental principles allowing us to make sense of our
physical environment. From an early age, humans perceive spatio-temporally contiguous …

In recent years, two well-developed methods of studying mental processes in humans have
been successively applied to dogs. First, eye-tracking has been used to study visual …