Overview
- The University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna team played recordings of happy and angry voices to 23 pet dogs standing on a pressure-sensing platform.
- Compared with silence, angry voices were associated with higher support surface values, indicating greater sway and reduced stability.
- Across individual dogs, happy voices destabilized 57% and produced stabilization or “freezing” in 43%.
- Angry voices produced the strongest destabilization in 30% of dogs, and 70% showed no balance change on this measure.
- Only the support surface parameter showed a consistent link to vocal emotion, and the authors urge larger studies to probe mechanisms and variability.