This captive environment presents very different stimuli than would be found by wolves in the wild. From a very young age, humans tend to be one of a dog's primary social contacts. Dogs live in extraordinarily close range with humans, in many societies kept solely as companion animals. The frequency of barking in dogs in relation to wolves could also be the product of the very different social environment of dogs. The experiment illustrates how selecting for one trait (in this case, tameness) can create profound by-products, both physical and behavioral. The behavior, too, of adult dogs shows puppy-like characteristics: dogs are submissive, they whine, and they frequently bark. Adult dogs have, for example, large heads, floppy ears, and shortened snouts – all characteristics seen in wolf puppies. Domesticated breeds show vast physical differences from their wild counterparts, notably an evolution that suggests neoteny, or the retention of juvenile characteristics in adults. As evidenced by the farm-fox experiment, the process of domestication alters a breed in more ways than just tameness. While a distinct reason for the difference is unknown, a strong hypothesis is that the vocal communication of dogs developed due to their domestication. Dogs have been known to bark for hours on end. Additionally, while wolf barks tend to be brief and isolated, dog barking is often repetitive. In contrast, dogs bark in a wide variety of social situations, with acoustic communication in dogs being described as hypertrophic.
According to Schassburger, wolves bark only in warning, defense, and protest. Wolf barks represent only 2.4% of all wolf vocalizations and are described as "rare" occurrences. In dogs ĭog barking is distinct from wolf barking. University of Massachusetts Amherst researchers define a bark as a short, abrupt vocalization that is relatively loud and high-pitched, changes in frequency and often repeats rapidly in succession. While there is not a precise, consistent and functional acoustic definition for barking, researchers may classify barks according to several criteria.
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