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A study that shows that dogs can "catch" human yawns provides evidence that dogs may be able to read the mind of their owners.
Scientists have known for decades that yawns are infectious among people, so much so that simply thinking about them can trigger a chain reaction of "contagious yawning". The phenomenon is thought to be linked with empathy and the ability to read the thoughts of another individual.
Now the first ever study to report that human yawns induce yawning in dogs found that 21 out of 29 dogs yawned in response to human yawning, showing that "dogs possess the capacity for a rudimentary form of empathy."
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