How Dogs Think

August 1, 2004
Friendly, authoritative and firmly grounded in scientific evidence, Coren's survey of canine biology and psychology will give readers a new appreciation of humankind's best animal friend. A psychologist and dog expert, Coren has an amused sort of enthusiasm for all things doggish; he likes both funny stories about pooches and serious research that logically explains their behavior. The combination will be familiar to fans of his previous bestsellers, The Intelligence of Dogs and How to Speak Dog, and it works just as well in this new volume. Chapters like"I Sniff, Therefore I Am" and"The Wrinkled Mind" teach readers what makes the canine nose so incredibly sensitive, why dogs have special taste buds that are sensitized to water, what's the difference between long and short growls, and why dogs like to sniff people in embarrassing spots. Dogs feel pain in similar ways to humans, Coren explains, but most cases of"dog ESP" or telepathy can be traced to sensitive hearing--or to humans' desire to believe in doggy ESP. In a chapter on genetics, he shows how anxiety disorder can be passed from mom to litter. Other chapters cover breeding and training, and the book concludes with a complex examination of the science and philosophy of canine consciousness. Coren doesn't dumb anything down but manages to make scientific information easy to understand--and he scatters practical tips for handling dogs at home throughout the text. This entertaining, well-researched book will please dog lovers of every stripe.