Available Now: What Dogs Know (Was Hunde wissen)

November 09, 2020

In their new book, Dr. Juliane Bräuer, Head of Dog Studies at the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Jena, and Dr. Juliane Kaminski, Director of the Dog Cognition Centre, University of Portsmouth, present new results from the most important studies of dog cognition over the last twenty years. The book includes behavioral tests, some of which readers can try out at home.

My dog understands me! At least, many dog owners think so. New scientific studies actually show that dogs understand a lot about us humans. For example, they can judge what humans can and cannot see. Some dogs can even distinguish between a large number of toys by name, like the Border Collie Rico who earned international fame.

But do dogs also understand our emotions? Can they grasp cause and effect relationships? What fascinates us humans about dogs? Is it only the proverbial ‘puppy dog eyes’ that make dogs look sympathetic? Or is it the fact that these animals have grown well-attuned to humans and are willing to cooperate with them?

In a total of ten chapters, Juliane Bräuer and Juliane Kaminski present the results of the most important scientific studies on dog cognition of the last twenty years. Was Hunde wissen is available now (German only) from Springer.