Why You Feeling Happy Makes Your Dog Seem Sad

Owning a dog may make you a happier person, but new research suggests that when people feel happy, they are more likely to think that dogs look sad.

This is the conclusion of a new study by behavioral scientists at Arizona State University (ASU), who found that when people felt happy, they rated dogs as sad, while people in a negative mood are more likely to see dogs as happy.

“Decades of research have shown that how people are feeling greatly influences how they perceive the emotions of other people. Happy people see others as happy, sad people see others as unhappy," paper author and psychologist professor Clive Wynne, director of the Canine Science Collaboratory at ASU, told Newsweek.

"We knew from our own past research that people are nothing like as good as they think they are at recognizing the emotions dogs are showing, so it stood to reason that if we made people happy or sad by showing them pictures that cheer or depress, then when they looked at dogs their mood should spill over into how they view the dog.

"Happy people should see dogs as happier than sad people do. It seemed obvious but fun to explore—especially since people love watching videos of dogs.”

To test the idea, researchers showed college students short video clips of three pet dogs reacting to everyday triggers.

Some clips were meant to capture a “good moment,” like a dog getting a treat or hearing an exciting word. Others showed a more unpleasant moment, like a dog noticing a vacuum cleaner.

A third set of clips showed the dogs doing nothing in particular, such as resting or waiting. The videos were edited so only the dog appeared on screen against a black background, with no people or context clues.

Before the students watched the clips, the research team tried to shift the students’ mood on purpose.

In the first experiment, students looked at a set of images commonly used in psychology studies to spark positive or negative feelings. Then were then asked to rate the dogs in the videos on simple scales, such as how happy or sad the dog looked or how calm or excited it seemed.

That first experiment produced a surprise. Even though the images successfully changed how the students said they felt, the mood shift did not change how they judged the dogs.

So the team ran a second experiment with a small but important change. Instead of using pictures that mostly featured people, the researchers used only dog images to set the mood. Think cheerful puppy photos for a positive mood, and more downbeat images of dogs in difficult situations for the negative.

This time, the researchers saw a clear and surprising pattern. Students who were nudged into a brighter mood tended to rate the dogs as looking sadder. Students nudged into a worse mood tended to rate the dogs as looking happier.

“What first felt like a disappointing non-finding turned out to be surprisingly intriguing. Just by switching species, an effect we consistently see in humans didn’t hold up," Holly Molinaro, president and senior animal welfare scientist at Animal Wellbeing Solutions, told Newsweek.

“But the most surprising findings came from the second part of the experiment. If participants were put in a low mood by viewing sad-looking dogs, they were actually more likely to rate the dogs in the subsequent videos as happier.”

Study co-author Clive Wynne. | Arizona State University

Why It Matters

The researchers say the findings matter because misreading a dog’s emotions is not just an awkward moment⁠⁠⁠—it can shape how people relate to dogs and take care of them.

“In this domain of how people understand dog's emotions, I'm continuously surprised,” said Wynne. “I feel like we are just scratching at the surface of what is turning out to be quite a big mystery.”

Previous research has revealed that misreading or overlooking emotional cues in dogs can lead to inappropriate handling, and even lead to animals getting stressed. While reading the expressions of dogs has proven particularly difficult for certain breeds.

Wynne explained that knowing more about how humans understand animals can help improve our relationship with them:“To give our dogs their best lives it is important that we understand how our dogs are feeling."

"People have strong intuitions about their dogs’ moods, but our research shows that these intuitions are often wrong and biased by many aspects of the world around dogs and people. We strive to help people understand their dogs better so they can lead richer and more satisfying lives together."

Reference

Molinaro, H. G., & Wynne, C. D. L. (2025). Paw-spective shift: How our mood alters the way we read dog emotions. PeerJ.