How toddlers interact with dogs helps explain how humans came to domesticate animals, scientists say
The human urge to lend a hand extends to animals from the earliest years of life, according to researchers who observed toddlers interacting with friendly dogs.
Children as young as two years old went out of their way to help dogs get toys and tasty treats that were placed beyond their reach, despite never having met the animals before, scientists found. The work suggests that toddlers could not only understand the dogs’ desires, but were willing and able to help them out, even though the chances of the dogs returning the favour were vanishingly small.
“It’s really special to see how early this begins,” said Dr Rachna Reddy, an evolutionary anthropologist and first author on the study, who holds posts at both“From early in our development we have tendencies to behave prosocially towards other people, to try to understand what’s going on in their minds,” she said. The latest study shows that even toddlers “have the motivation and the ability to extend this kind of helping behaviour to other animals,” she added.
Friendly behaviour towards other species, even in children who are still learning to walk and talk, may have helped humans thrive around the world, the researchers say. Apparently altruistic acts, such as leaving food out for animals, could have underpinned practices that led to the domestication of species from dogs and cats to cows, pigs, sheep and horses.
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