5 embarrassing things we do with our pets
1. Pet selfies
The habit of taking selfies isn't just for humans! We love your pets and all the pictures we see every day on social media. The hashtag “dog” is a top 85 most used tag on instagram with more than 52 million posts. From celebrities like Lady Gaga to the President, people can’t help but to capture their best friends doing cute things.
This account has taken the dog instagram photo to the extreme, with photos like this one: Taking some pictures is ok, as long as you don’t make it hard for them, instagram away! Just don’t get mad at them when the pose is not perfect or their nose looks a little shiny on the picture. Remember to follow us on Instagram for all the updates on our office puppies.
2. Spooning
So fluffy, so soft and warm, It would be a crime not to spoon with her! Sometimes, when your puppy or even a big dog comes to lay down with you, you just have to sleep with them. Wondering how to show your dog you love them? Give them a big hug!On the website IsThisNormal.com, 93% of the voters considered spooning with your canine friend a normal behavior. That's good enough for us!
But we are talking about spooning casually here, like on the living room floor after a long day of work, or on the grass at the park. Sleeping with your dog is a completely different thing. And it’s gross.
The woman on this forum was surprised that her colleagues considered the practice disgusting and really, by the sound of it, she needs some help… Who would refer to their dog as “my little booboo”?
3. Pretend they understand us
According to Men’s Health Magazine, 71% of men believe their dog can understand them in some telepathic way, but do they? In the 2001 study “Owner's beliefs on the ability of their pet dogs to understand human verbal communication: A case of social understanding” (yes, there was an academic paper on the topic) the authors gathered data supporting the idea that “communications between dogs and owners could be described as a form of social understanding.”
Social understanding is the process in which the individual combines contextual and social information reacting accordingly. So, your dog might put the pieces together between your words, tone of voice and facial expression to do what you say and sometimes to even understand if they did something wrong, but those conversations on politics and your love life might not have been received as you were hoping.
4. The baby talk
There is something in women’s maternal instincts that seems to translate to the way they treat cute dogs; inevitably for some, the high pitch, slow “baby talk” comes out when such women encounter a puppy too beautiful to stay quiet. A similar phenomenon occurs in men, most often in the form of a “who’s a good boy?”.
As much as you think your dog appreciates the baby talk and feels warmth in its heart when listening to that pathetic squeal, a study confirmed that there are things your puppy will like much more, like a classic silent tummy rub. Across all experimental groups, dogs preferred petting to vocal praise. We next assessed time spent with each alternative when only one alternative was available at a time in shelter dogs and owned dogs.
Shelter dogs were tested with a stranger and owned dogs were tested with their owners providing the interaction. Dogs alternated between petting and vocal praise, vocal praise and no interaction, or received only petting for eight 3-min sessions of each comparison. Both shelter and owned dogs spent significantly longer in proximity to the experimenter when the interaction was petting compared to vocal praise. Vocal praise produced as little proximity-seeking behavior as did no interaction.
Additionally, dogs did not show any sign of satiation with petting across all eight sessions. Overall, petting seems to be an important interaction between dogs and humans that might maintain inter-specific social behavior but vocal praise likely has to be specifically conditioned. This article is part of a Special Issue entitled: Canine Behavior.
5. Referring to yourselves as mom and dad
It is easy to see our pets as children. After all, we have to care for them, feed them, train them, and make sure they grow up healthy. For some couples, having a pet is the first step to having kids and the outcomes could indicate who will be the disciplinarian and who will be the fun one.
Although the term “pet parent” has become somewhat controversial, especially when accompanied by strollers and overly complex pet dinners, there is more to it than marketing strategies trying to sell us something. We believe it signals the responsibility pet owners feel and the strong bond that’s created between them and their pets, it also helps the division of tasks and helps the animal respond to different types of authority.
Are these 5 things weird or embarrassing? We don't think so; It's just a few ways how to show your dog that you love them!
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DOG PERSON🐶
Pets: I have a half border collie, half angel named Mikey.
Fun stuff: My dog's tongue is slightly longer than her face, so frequently her tongue sticks out a little even when her mouth is closed.
