Do Dogs Really Miss You When You’re Gone? Signs They Miss You
Have you ever wondered why your dog gets so excited when you return home? We miss our pets when we’re away. But do our dogs miss us back?
Do Our Dogs Miss Us When We’re Away?
Yes, dogs do miss us. Dogs are very loyal and faithful companion animals. Science has proven that dogs do miss us, like what we’d always hoped.
According to Science Alert, the team of Braincraft found out that the caudate nucleus of dogs’ brains, which is a region associated with positive rewards and expectations, lit up when they smelt a familiar human. To test whether dogs miss their owners, the researchers trained the dogs to lay still in an MRI machine.
The dogs were then exposed to five different scents, including their own scent, a familiar and unfamiliar human, and the scent of a familiar and unfamiliar canine. And the result has shown that dogs have favourable reactions to the scent of their owners. Read more:
Dogs have associative memory – when a dog associates a visual cue, smell or sound with a known behaviour or emotion. Your dog, for instance, may associate car key jingling in your pocket with a familiar behaviour of you opening the front door and may start to cry as you get ready to leave the house. They also learn to associate the scent of their humans with positive experiences.
As your smell becomes a pleasant aromatic for your dog, that association makes for a strong emotional bond. Your dog’s positive associations with you mean that he’s constantly remembering you – he won’t forget about you!
There’s evidence to show that our canine friends remember things the clearest when there are strong emotions attach to the memories. Read more: Things Humans Do That Dogs Dislike
Signs That Your Dog Misses You
1. Your dog cries when you leave.
Does your dog cry when you leave? Dogs that aren’t happy when their owners leave can make noises trying to let their owners know. Bear in mind that dogs are vocal animals.
They tend to use their barking, whining, crying or howling to communicate. When your dog cries when left alone all day, it means that he doesn’t want you to leave the house. Read more:
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2. Your dog stares at or sits by the door after you leave.
Does your dog lie down at the front door until you reach home? If your beloved canine friend plants himself by the door when he’s home alone, it might be his way of trying to get out and see you again. This is because your dog doesn’t want to miss an opportunity to see what you’re doing.
3. Your dog is super excited when you reach home.
Most of the dogs are so insanely happy to see their humans come home. They are emotional beings just like us. Like how we greet our family members after coming back home from work, dogs greet their owners with love and wagging tails – and also in the form of licking. Dogs love to be loved. That’s why they are so happy when they are around their humans.
4. Your dog follows you around the house.
Our canine friends always have good reasons for following us everywhere! Dogs are social animals and they do enjoy human companionship. Your clingy furbaby will stick to you like glue and will never let you out of his sight when you’re home. Read more:
5. Your dog engages in destructive behaviours while you’re away.
Some dogs are too attached to their owners and may start acting destructively as soon as their owners start to leave for the day. Barking, chewing the furniture, inappropriate elimination are the common signs of separation anxiety in dogs.
Dogs who suffer from separation anxiety may howl or bark all day because they don’t like being left home alone. Read more: