Social media often sees “button dog” videos go viral, showing small dogs tapping soundboards with prerecorded words like “walk,” “park,” or “mom.” But are these pets truly communicating or just well-trained? New research doesn’t provide a definitive answer but it does begin to explore the world of button dogs and how they react to both the buttons and their humans.
The study, published in PLOS ONE and conducted by scientists at the University of California at San Diego, is the first in a series aimed at answering the larger question of whether dogs can learn to communicate their desires by tapping buttons.
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