Dog parents rejoice! Baby talk with your dog is actually good for them
By Robin Lempel
A new study reveals dogs enjoy it and form a better emotional connection with us when we use baby talk on them. Who knew?
Dogs are our pets, sure, but more often than not, we see them as members of our family. To some dog lovers, they treat their pets like children, furry babies they adore.
And sure, an adoring dog parent may go a little overboard by dressing their pup up in outfits, pushing them around in doggy strollers… and then, of course, there’s the baby talk.
It can be so grating and ridiculous, but so many dog owners just love cooing at their good doggies, telling them they’re going on walkies and giving them some wa wa.
I’ll admit it. I sometimes slip into a baby voice when I talk to my pup. And I immediately get embarrassed if I notice someone overheard me. But it turns out, talking to your dog in a baby voice is actually a good thing!
Animal Cognition recently published a study that was done in York, U.K., which said that dogs pay more attention when people use a baby voice when they’re talking to them. And dogs actually make a deeper emotional connection to us when we use baby talk with them.
I definitely find this to be true. My dog’s tail actually starts to wag when I start talking to her in the baby voice. It’s strange but adorable.
The study looked at people’s relationships with their adult dogs and learned that dogs liked the high-pitched, emotional baby talk or “dog-directed speech” more than the “adult-directed speech,” which is the way we talk to other adult people. They also loved it when people used words relevant to dogs like “dog” and “walk” rather than just regular everyday speech.
This makes sense. According to The Huffington Post, dogs do recognize some language, especially words that pertain to them.
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So go ahead. Let your inner crazy dog parent out. Get that high-pitched voice ready and start baby talking away. It’s for the good of your dogs, after all. They love it!