A dog's stomach is turning is not necessarily a sign

The dog is closing his belly It can be said that they are absolutely honest with their owners, so they often do many similar actions when playing with them. We often say that when dogs show their bellies to us, it is a sign of confidence. It is actually not a big precaution for their owners, because they trust that their owners will not hurt them. But if your dog does this like a stranger, it doesn't necessarily mean he does it because he trusts you.

The dog lies down on the ground and shows its belly. Does this action show submission? The current argument is as follows. However, supporting research may prove otherwise, or our understanding may be corrupted.

A new study from the University of Lethbridge in Canada and the University of South Africa shows that lying on your belly may be more of an indication of aggression rather than a sign of compliance. . Researchers investigated the process of a medium-sized female dog playing with different dogs, 33 in total. It also analyzed 20 videos of dogs playing on video websites, and studied the behavior of dogs repeatedly turning over and lying down.

So what did they create? The behavior of a dog turning over and lying down does not meet the legal definition. Instead, this seems to be a defensive strategy, to avoid being bitten on the neck or to prepare for an immediate attack.

Dr. Sergio Pellis, a professor of neurology at the University of Lethbridge and one of the authors of the article, said: "We were surprised that there were no cases in the sample where the belly-turning movement could be seen as submissive. This suggests that claims in other studies that this movement shows submissiveness overstate the role of organizational relationships in dogs' social behavior. , and its correlation with game behavior. ”

In other words, lying down on your belly is not always related to organization and compliance. The researchers explain that smaller or weaker dogs should be more likely to perform this action if the action in the game shows "I surrender", but according to their observation, it is larger dogs who are more likely to do it.

In addition, they also pointed out that if this action shows surrender, the dog will probably maintain this posture for a longer time, but the actual situation is that the time they maintain this action is relatively short.

So why do we know that this is an obedient behavior? Perris mentioned previous research on wolves. In wolves, due to disadvantages. Animals in this position will turn over and lie down to show their compliance, but this situation often occurs in non-play situations.

"Even if the ancestors of dogs are. Wolf, the two actions are very different. To further understand dog behavior, we need to seriously examine the role of dogs as human companions in the current situation. "Perris said.

The reason why dogs sometimes turn their stomachs in front of us is because many owners like to help their dogs massage their stomachs, and dogs are very fond of massaging their stomachs. It is also trustworthy for the owner, because the owner has no reason to harm them, and the long-term relationship also makes the dog in a completely relaxed state in front of the owner, but there is still some tolerance for outsiders. Guard your heart, because in a battle in the wild, the neck is a very vulnerable part, so doing this can effectively prevent the neck from being attacked, so if a stranger sees a dog doing this to you, don't do it. Play with them as soon as you get up, lest the dog does this because of the guard, and may get bitten if it suddenly gets up. So even if the dog shows their belly to us, we must first understand what kind of situation it is.

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