For instance, dog owner Victoria Standen gained some insight on her pet. Victoria owns a collie named Cassie which has proven to be one of the smartest dog breeds. When they are out for a walk, her dog sits at a certain crossroad, and will wait to see which way its owner takes her. "I've taken to pointing which direction and after she looks that way, she looks back to me to check it's okay to run off," says Standen.
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Victoria also confirmed that when people interacting with her showed themselves to be untrustworthy, and also not being a food source for the dog, her collie would not engage them and avoid them. Bradshaw agrees that dogs are intelligent but their brain works differently than man’s. "Dogs are very sensitive to human behaviour but they have fewer preconceptions. They live in the present, they don't reflect back on the past in an abstract way, or plan for the future,” says Bradshaw.
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It’s been proven through earlier experiments that dogs can totally tell how you are feeling based on your facial expressions. In fact, they only decide if they will follow our cues based our gestures and expressions, which should tells us that they are highly perceptive, especially if put up to a task. They are also especially sensitive to their owner’s feelings and try to figure out how they are reacting and why they are reacting in a certain way.
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Dogs are not mindlessly following commands and Brian Hare, chief scientific officer at Dognition agrees. "They evaluate the information we give them based in part on how reliable it is in helping them accomplish their goals. Many family dogs, for instance, will ignore your gesture when you point incorrectly and use their memory to find a hidden treat,” says Hare.
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