Domestic
dogs inherited complex behaviors, such as bite inhibition, from their wolf
ancestors, which would have been pack hunters with complex body language. These
sophisticated forms of social cognition and communication may account for their
trainability, playfulness, and ability to fit into human households and social
situations, and these attributes have given dogs a relationship with humans
that has enabled them to become one of the most successful species on the
planet today.
The
dogs' value to early human hunter-gatherers led to them quickly becoming
ubiquitous across world cultures. Dogs perform many roles for people, such as
hunting, herding, pulling loads, protection, assisting police and military,
companionship, and, more recently, aiding handicapped individuals. This
influence on human society has given them the nickname "man's best
friend" in the Western world. In some cultures, however, dogs are also a
source of meat.
Early roles
Wolves,
and their dog descendants, would have derived significant benefits from living
in human camps—more safety, more reliable food, lesser caloric needs, and more
chance to breed. They would have benefited from humans' upright gait that gives
them larger range over which to see potential predators and prey, as well as
better color vision that, at least by day, gives humans better visual discrimination.
Camp dogs would also have benefited from human tool use, as in bringing down
larger prey and controlling fire for a range of purposes.
The
dogs of Thibet are twice the size of those seen in India, with large heads and
hairy bodies. They are powerful animals, and are said to be able to kill a
tiger. During the day they are kept chained up, and are let loose at night to
guard their masters' house.
Humans
would also have derived enormous benefit from the dogs associated with their
camps. For instance, dogs would have improved sanitation by cleaning up food
scraps. Dogs may have provided warmth, as referred to in the Australian
Aboriginal expression "three dog night" (an exceptionally cold
night), and they would have alerted the camp to the presence of predators or
strangers, using their acute hearing to provide an early warning.
Anthropologists
believe the most significant benefit would have been the use of dogs' robust
sense of smell to assist with the hunt. The relationship between the presence
of a dog and success in the hunt is often mentioned as a primary reason for the
domestication of the wolf, and a 2004 study of hunter groups with and without a
dog gives quantitative support to the hypothesis that the benefits of
cooperative hunting was an important factor in wolf domestication.
The
cohabitation of dogs and humans would have greatly improved the chances of
survival for early human groups, and the domestication of dogs may have been
one of the key forces that led to human success.
Emigrants
from Siberia that walked across the Bering land bridge into North America may
have had dogs in their company, and one writer suggests that the use of sled
dogs may have been critical to the success of the waves that entered North
America roughly 12,000 years ago, although the earliest archaeological evidence
of dog-like canids in North America dates from about 9,400 years ago.:104 Dogs
were an important part of life for the Athabascan population in North America,
and were their only domesticated animal. Dogs also carried much of the load in
the migration of the Apache and Navajo tribes 1,400 years ago. Use of dogs as
pack animals in these cultures often persisted after the introduction of the
horse to North America.
As pets
It
is estimated that three-quarters of the world's dog population lives in the
developing world as feral, village, or community dogs, with pet dogs uncommon.
"The
most widespread form of interspecies bonding occurs between humans and
dogs" and the keeping of dogs as companions, particularly by elites, has a
long history. (As a possible example, at the Natufian culture site of Ain
Mallaha in Israel, dated to 12,000 BC, the remains of an elderly human and a
four-to-five-month-old puppy were found buried together). However, pet dog
populations grew significantly after World War II as suburbanization increased.
In the 1950s and 1960s, dogs were kept outside more often than they tend to be
today (using the expression "in the doghouse" to describe exclusion
from the group signifies the distance between the doghouse and the home) and
were still primarily functional, acting as a guard, children's playmate, or walking
companion. From the 1980s, there have been changes in the role of the pet dog,
such as the increased role of dogs in the emotional support of their human
guardians. People and dogs have become increasingly integrated and implicated
in each other's lives, to the point where pet dogs actively shape the way a
family and home are experienced.
There
have been two major trends in the changing status of pet dogs. The first has
been the 'commodification' of the dog, shaping it to conform to human
expectations of personality and behaviour. The second has been the broadening
of the concept of the family and the home to include dogs-as-dogs within everyday
routines and practices.
There
are a vast range of commodity forms available to transform a pet dog into an
ideal companion. The list of goods, services and places available is enormous:
from dog perfumes, couture, furniture and housing, to dog groomers, therapists,
trainers and caretakers, dog cafes, spas, parks and beaches, and dog hotels,
airlines and cemeteries. While dog training as an organized activity can be
traced back to the 18th century, in the last decades of the 20th century it
became a high-profile issue as many normal dog behaviors such as barking,
jumping up, digging, rolling in dung, fighting, and urine marking (which dogs
do to establish territory through scent), became increasingly incompatible with
the new role of a pet dog. Dog training books, classes and television programs
proliferated as the process of commodifying the pet dog continued.
The
majority of contemporary people with dogs describe their pet as part of the
family, although some ambivalence about the relationship is evident in the
popular reconceptualization of the dog–human family as a pack. A dominance
model of dog–human relationships has been promoted by some dog trainers, such
as on the television program Dog Whisperer. However it has been disputed that
"trying to achieve status" is characteristic of dog–human interactions.
Pet dogs play an active role in family life; for example, a study of
conversations in dog–human families showed how family members use the dog as a
resource, talking to the dog, or talking through the dog, to mediate their interactions
with each other.
Increasingly,
human family members are engaging in activities centered on the perceived needs
and interests of the dog, or in which the dog is an integral partner, such as
dog dancing and dog yoga.
According
to statistics published by the American Pet Products Manufacturers Association
in the National Pet Owner Survey in 2009–2010, it is estimated there are 77.5
million people with pet dogs in the United States. The same survey shows nearly
40% of American households own at least one dog, of which 67% own just one dog,
25% two dogs and nearly 9% more than two dogs. There does not seem to be any
gender preference among dogs as pets, as the statistical data reveal an equal
number of female and male dog pets. Yet, although several programs are ongoing
to promote pet adoption, less than a fifth of the owned dogs come from a
shelter.
The
latest study using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) comparing humans and dogs
showed that dogs have same response to voices and use the same parts of the
brain as humans do. This gives dogs the ability to recognize emotional human
sounds, making them friendly social pets to humans.
Work
Dogs
have lived and worked with humans in so many roles that they have earned the
unique nickname, "man's best friend", a phrase used in other
languages as well. They have been bred for herding livestock, hunting (e.g.
pointers and hounds), rodent control, guarding, helping fishermen with nets,
detection dogs, and pulling loads, in addition to their roles as companions. In
1957, a husky-terrier mix named Laika became the first animal to orbit the
Earth.
Service
dogs such as guide dogs, utility dogs, assistance dogs, hearing dogs, and psychological
therapy dogs provide assistance to individuals with physical or mental
disabilities. Some dogs owned by epileptics have been shown to alert their
handler when the handler shows signs of an impending seizure, sometimes well in
advance of onset, allowing the guardian to seek safety, medication, or medical
care.
Dogs
included in human activities in terms of helping out humans are usually called
working dogs.
Sports and shows
People
often enter their dogs in competitions such as breed-conformation shows or
sports, including racing, sledding and agility competitions.
In
conformation shows, also referred to as breed shows, a judge familiar with the
specific dog breed evaluates individual purebred dogs for conformity with their
established breed type as described in the breed standard. As the breed
standard only deals with the externally observable qualities of the dog (such
as appearance, movement, and temperament), separately tested qualities (such as
ability or health) are not part of the judging in conformation shows.
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