No matter how guilty your dog might look after eating your slippers, . 聽
According to behaviorists, dogs don鈥檛 feel guilt. That regretful look鈥攅ars pulled back, head lowered鈥攊s a reaction to your yelling, not the damage caused.
“Just get over it and remind yourself not to put temptation in the way next time,” Dr. Bonnie Beaver, a professor at Texas A&M University’s College of Veterinary Medicine and executive director of the American College of Veterinary Behaviorists, .
In 2009, researchers . Dogs were left alone in a room with a treat their owners had forbidden them to eat. Some dogs ate the biscuit, while others resisted, but in each case the 鈥済uilty look鈥 was associated with the owner鈥檚 actions鈥攏ot the dog鈥檚. 聽
Those scientific findings haven鈥檛 prevented the growth of online dog shaming sites like and . Many of these images show dogs鈥攕urrounded by the remnants of their misdeeds鈥攚ith guilt written all over their muzzles. Or at least that鈥檚 how we perceive it.聽