Wolves lead and dogs follow, but they both cooperate with humans.

ABSTRACT: Due to their convergent evolution, dogs have been suggested as a good model for the evolution of human social skills, such as tolerance and cooperativeness. However, recent studies have revealed that wolves (dogs' closest undomesticated relatives) are more tolerant and cooperative with conspecifics than dogs. It is still possible, though, that selection during domestication enhanced cooperative inclinations specifically towards humans, predicting better cooperation with humans in dogs than in wolves. We tested this hypothesis by comparing similarly human-raised wolves and dogs when cooperating with a familiar human partner in a string-pulling task. Both dogs and wolves were highly successful with the human partner, highlighting that dog-human cooperation could have evolved based on wolves'

SUBMITTER: Range F 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6405935 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature