Why do we talk to them while thinking "animals do not understand words"?


ByCristian Bortes www.eyeem.com/bortescristian

"Is it a weird thing to tell many times on a day that you love cats?" And a sister asked about the love cats and editorsArianna ReboliniInterviewed scientists who are studying the relationship between animals and humans as they wondered, "I never thought about it, but surely why I would talk to pets?" Why do we think that "Animals do not understand human language" while thinking? That is summarized.

Why Do Humans Talk to Animals If They Can not Understand? - The Atlantic
https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2017/08/talking-to-pets/537225/


According to Hal Herzog of the University of Western Carolina, "To humans inherentlyAnthropomorphic viewThe act of "talking to a pet" is extremely natural, because it has the property of being naked. An anthropomorphic view is to find forms and properties similar to humans for animals and plants and inanimate objects other than human beings, God Buddha and concepts.

We are anthropomorphic about ourselves, for example, I feel sorry for colored pencils that I never used, I feel angry for smartphones that I can not charge, or do hitchhiking It is because humans anthropomorphize things other than humans to listen to the news that robots were destroyed and to feel sorrow.


Especially for animals and AI, "people feel a life" people have a strong anthropomorphic impulse. And since pets are often thought of as members of their families, they talk to them while understanding that they do not understand the language.

However, according to previous studies, we know that the way that people talk to people is different from how people talk to pets.

Studies on the relationship between animals and humans are mainly targeted at dogs due to the length of history and interest in treatment effects. And research on the exchange of words between dogs and humans showed that when humans talk to dogs they tend to be short, concise and grammatically correct words. And the question of "What day was today?" Such as asking for free answers is rarely done, taking the form of a question answered "Yes" or "No" like "Were it fun?", It seems that the height of the voice will also rise. These features are the same as human beings talking to the baby, and it is thought that the characteristics such as big eyes and small nose are common for babies and animals.

So, as "personification" is the inherent nature of human beings, why is there a degree difference among people? About thisResearch was conducted in 2008. This research is intended for subjects who "have nothing to do with society and need to" create "exchanges with people" and "subjects who" want to control life in order to feel unease in an uncertain environment " was. Who can apply the above two types more easily to anthropomorphize animals? The researchers thought.

As a result of the research, subjects who are chronically lonely often express pets in words such as "thoughtful" or "thoughtful" as compared with those who have much involvement with society, I showed that it was supporting me like that. Also, it was said that subjects who wanted to control their daily lives themselves also tended to project emotions and consciousness to dogs compared with those who did not. This is thought to try to predict behavior of animals by capturing human interaction with animals.

Although this does not mean "people who do not have friends treat pets like human beings", it seems likely that people talk to pets because they want to believe "animals understand the words" . It may be fearful in some ways to make life together with what you do not understand at all and what you do not know.

Meanwhile, Mr. Herzog says, "When we talk to pets they will respond, the dog raises her face and will see them? Would you like to" go out "to the cat I keep? When she hears it, she crawls and cries, I do not think she handles the words in the same way as I, but the foundation of the communication system is still a language, "he says, I am arguing that the act of talking to animals is not just a one - way street.

ByJonas Vincent

Also,A study of 2016 for dogsWhen I applied the dog by fMRI, I understood that the dog 's brain treated words with a left hemisphere just like a human being and chanting on the right hemisphere against familiar words. With this, it can not be said that "dog understands language" immediately, but it can be said that it recognizes less.

However, human beings do not want to talk to anything if they are living things. Mr. Herzog seems to have kept a snake in the past, but it is said that it was difficult to talk to the snake. From this also, whether human beings talk to pets as for human beings depends on whether the pet "have something human-like on the pet" such as big eyes or a round nose, "cute" "reaction" Are considered to be involved in a great deal.

Nicholas Epley, a behavioral scientist involved in the 2008 research, said the act of talking to a pet is due to the same psychological process as human beings recognize others' consciousness, "what pet Whether it is the appearance of intelligence, "he says. There may be people who regard the act of talking to a pet as stupid, but "It is not a matter of ourself but a response by a wonderful ability of the brain".

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