Evolution of facial muscle anatomy in dogs

Kaminski, J, Waller, BM ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6303-7458, Diogo, R, Hartstone-Rose, A and Burrows, AM, 2019. Evolution of facial muscle anatomy in dogs. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 116 (29), pp. 14677-14681. ISSN 0027-8424

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Abstract

Domestication shaped wolves into dogs and transformed both their behavior and their anatomy. Here we show that, in only 33,000 y, domestication transformed the facial muscle anatomy of dogs specifically for facial communication with humans. Based on dissections of dog and wolf heads, we show that the levator anguli oculi medialis, a muscle responsible for raising the inner eyebrow intensely, is uniformly present in dogs but not in wolves. Behavioral data, collected from dogs and wolves, show that dogs produce the eyebrow movement significantly more often and with higher intensity than wolves do, with highest-intensity movements produced exclusively by dogs. Interestingly, this movement increases paedomorphism and resembles an expression that humans produce when sad, so its production in dogs may trigger a nurturing response in humans. We hypothesize that dogs with expressive eyebrows had a selection advantage and that "puppy dog eyes" are the result of selection based on humans' preferences.

Item Type:	Journal article
Publication Title:	Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
Creators:	Kaminski, J., Waller, B.M., Diogo, R., Hartstone-Rose, A. and Burrows, A.M.
Publisher:	National Academy of Sciences
Date:	16 July 2019
Volume:	116
Number:	29
ISSN:	0027-8424
Identifiers:	Number Type 10.1073/pnas.1820653116 DOI 1372211 Other
Rights:	Copyright © 2019 the Author(s). Published by PNAS. This open access article is distributed under Creative Commons Attribution License 4.0 (CC BY).
Divisions:	Schools > School of Social Sciences
Record created by:	Jill Tomkinson
Date Added:	13 Oct 2020 14:42
Last Modified:	31 May 2021 15:13
URI:	https://irep.ntu.ac.uk/id/eprint/41286

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