Your dog isn’t wagging his tail because he’s happy.

Anyone who has or has dog Have you ever seen your furry friend greet you with a wagging tail when you arrive home? Or when you approach him with a bowl of food. This and many other reactions have always made us think that dogs wag their tail when they are happy. However, the truth is that there is no scientific consensus on this issue.

In fact, a group of Dutch and Austrian scientists have just published in Letters in Biology alternative hypothesis based on analysis more than 100 studies on this topic. It should be noted that this is not a typical study but rather an opinion piece in which they also follow the scientific method to hypothesize the reason why dogs wag their tail.

According to them, while it is true that they move it when they are happy, the reality is somewhat broader. Perhaps this is a movement resulting from the process domestication, which reacts to almost any emotional impulse, not necessarily to happiness. This is confirmed primarily by research conducted on foxes. But let’s see how they arrived at this hypothesis.

Background Information on Why Dogs Wag Their Tails

In this new article, the authors cite several studies about the reasons why dogs wag their tails. Some of them stand out. For example, one that shows that aggressive dogs They are the ones most likely to wag their tail. Also another one in which they usually do this movement when they want food, so this could be a way to do petition, more than just showing happiness. In fact, this behavior has been found with others as well. a lot of emotions.

But, without a doubt, the most considered studies are the experiments conducted with silver foxes. This is not actually a different species of fox. This is a case of melanism, like black panthers. These are foxes that are born with an imbalance in their normal levels of pigments, so instead of appearing brown, they turn greyish-black.

They are well known in science, as several domestication experiments have been carried out on them over the past decades. That is, they were bred and selected generation after generation to demonstrate how such behavior can change a species. Just like wolves They turned into dogs.

In one such experiment, conducted during 40 generations It was observed that most foxes had a characteristic tail movement that dogs also have. Once the desired features were selected, this was never a thought. The main idea was to make the foxes docile and friendly. However, they ended up wagging their tail, why?

A question of rhythm

The hypothesis of the authors of the latest article is that dogs wag their tail to unconscious taming. That is, when generation after generation was selected, from wolves to dogs, people selected those who moved their tails, but they did not realize it. This happens because the human brain has a natural preference rhythmic stimuli. This is what makes us such musical animals.

We’re not the only ones though. There are studies that show that other mammals, such as mice, also prefer these stimuli. This may be due to a hereditary form time. So your dog won’t be wagging his tail with happiness when you get home. Or maybe yes. But in fact, if this happens, it is because a very distant ancestor, without realizing it, decided that it was better to immortalize those little wolves who moved their tails with almost any emotion.