How Does Your Dog See the World?

So I’m currently working on my module on bio-chemistry of the canine brain and it’s got me thinking about a few things. Firstly, although I felt I understood how dogs had sensory differences to us humans, I really hadn’t given enough thought to just how differently they experience and interpret the world around them. We get dogs, we anthropomorphise them and expect them to fit into our human lifestyles, often without really giving any thought to what this life is actually like for them. So, I thought I’d write today’s blog about canine senses, and just how much they differ from ours and what this actually means for our canine friends in terms of how they see the world they live in and how our behaviour may impact them in ways we don’t realise. This is going to cover three main senses; vision, hearing, and smelling.

The first one to talk about has got to be scent. It’s not unknown that dogs have a much keener sense of smell than us humans, but what does that actually mean for them? Sense of smell is officially termed as the olfactory sense, and is modulated by an olfactory bulb in the brain. The olfactory bulb is responsible for receiving, processing and relaying scent information to the rest of the brain. Both humans and dogs have an olfactory bulb but their are some differences. Firstly, a dog's olfactory bulb is 30 times larger than a human’s and significantly more of a dog's brain is dedicated to processing scent information. Dogs use scents in a way so completely different to humans and it is crucial to their understanding of their environment. A 2022 neuro-imaging study found white matter pathways linking the olfactory bulb directly to a visual cortex, a pathway that does not exist at all in the human brain. When a dog sniffs, that information it gathers is literally being fed into their vision. Us humans typically understand our environment visually, when we go somewhere new, we are gathering almost all the information visually that we then use to make judgements and decisions. For dogs, they do this through scent. In the way that we recognise a familiar person by looking at their face, a dog recognising a familiar person through smelling them. In fact, dogs brains are quite bad at distinguishing faces and focus much more on scent information in order to recognise someone.

The reason that this is so important to think about is because our dogs like to sniff, a lot, especially on walks. And it isn’t uncommon to see people pulling their dogs away so they can get on with their walk. However, when your dog stops to have that sniff, they are learning about their environment, they are engaging their brain. They feel interested, stimulated and fulfilled from gathering this information. In the same way that you might want to stop a look at a landmark or enjoy the views on your walk, your dog wants to stop and sniff so that they can get that same enriching feeling from building that picture of the environment they’re in. Not only is it really important that we let our dogs stop and sniff because it will make them more fulfilled, but because it will actually help to make them more tired for us when we get back home. Your dog is happy, fulfilled, tired and wants to rest. You are happy because your dogs happy and isn’t bouncing off the walls. Consider how tired you can become after doing an entirely stationary but mentally taxing task such as reading a book or solving a puzzle. That’s exactly what sniffing does for our dogs brain, it gets it working, and it tires it out.

Another thing to consider at home with your dog is the use of chemicals in your home. Cleaning products, perfume, deodorant, air fresheners, these are all things we use because we like them. But what about our dogs? A dogs sense of smell is up to 100,000 more sensitive than ours. Think about that, and I mean really think about that. Think of the smell of a cleaning product in your home and then amplify it, significantly, that’s what your dog has to smell. A lot of cleaning products such as aerosols also tend to end up settling on your floor, which is exactly where your dog spends a significant amount of time. This is not to say you shouldn’t clean your home or use deodorant. However, you should give thought to the type of chemicals you are using, consider dog-friendly alternatives that are less pungent, and keep areas ventilated during cleaning. A sign that your dog could be becoming irritated with these smells in the home can be sneezing and pawing at their faces.

Lastly is vision. It is a myth that dogs see in black and white, however, they do see in more dulled colours. Their vision is also less accurate than ours in some areas. Firstly, dogs vision is more movement focused and they may gather less detail from stationary objects. Secondly, their range perception and clarity are affected. A dog would need to see an object at 6 feet to get the same detail that we would get from viewing that object from 20 feet. Because a dogs vision can be less clear, this means they rely on their hearing and olfactory senses for much of their interpretation. With regards to hearing, dogs brains are much more receptive to nonvocal sounds than humans. Human brains have evolved to focus on language comprehension whereas our dogs brains have developed to focus on environmental sounds. Although we know that dogs can understand some words, they focus much more heavily on the sound of the words rather than the actual content. This means our tone. Our dogs are much more receptive to the tone that we use rather than what we actually say. This is super easy to test on your own dog. Go up to your dog and in a soft, high pitched, excitable voice, tell them how naughty they’ve been. This sounds mean, but you’ll see your dog is actually really excited about this! You shouldn’t try this next one because it is actually mean but alternatively, if you go and tell your dog what a lovely handsome good boy he has been but in a stern, low voice. He’s likely going to feel pretty bad about this.

This by no means covers all the ways in which our dogs understand the world, but it’s food for thought. We bring our dogs into our homes and expect them to adapt and fit in. But what we really need to truly comprehend and think about is just how differently the world is to them. They don’t look around and see what we see, it is a whole different world. And they are trying to navigate their canine world in our human environment that we have constructed for them. Spend a few days trying to see and understand the world how your dog might and see if their are any habits that are maybe making your dog not quite as happy as they could be. Take it easy with the chemicals, let them have that sniff on their walk, and give that praise with a little extra enthusiasm.