Tuesday, July 24, 2018
Decreased knowledge
Another case of "social" "science" spending money and time to "prove" a perfectly obvious fact, and then SUBTRACTING from common knowledge by supplying a dubious conclusion.
Perfectly obvious part:
Sanford and her colleagues instructed the owners of 34 dogs to either give distressed cries or to hum while sitting behind a see-through closed door. Sixteen of these dogs were registered therapy dogs. The researchers watched what the dogs did, and also measured their heart rate variability to see how they physically reacted to the situation. In another part of the experiment, the researchers examined how these same dogs gazed at their owners to measure the strength of their relationship. Dogs that heard distress calls were no more likely to open a door than dogs that heard someone humming. However, they opened the door much faster if their owner was crying.Duh. = = = = = Subtracted knowledge part:
Based on their physiological and behavioral responses, dogs who opened the door were, in fact, less stressed than they were during baseline measurements, indicating that those who could suppress their own distress were the ones who could jump into action. The study therefore provides evidence that dogs not only feel empathy towards people, but in some cases also act on this empathy. This happens especially when they are able to suppress their own feelings of distress and can focus on those of the human involved.We don't know what the dogs are thinking, but we do know what humans are thinking in similar situations. In fact the decreased stress DOESN'T come from suppressing our own feelings. That would RAMP UP the physical stress! The decrease in heart rate comes from accomplishing the task. We get anxious when we hear or see trouble, or less dramatically when we see a problem that needs to be solved. After we've done what we can about the trouble, we're less stressed. The accelerating hormone has done its job, so it shuts off. ¶ 1:52 PM
