Do Dogs Instinctively Love People?

What do you think of the following quote about the dog-human relationship? How true is it?
“It is scarcely possible to doubt that the love of man has become instinctive in the dog.”
—Charles Darwin http://darwin-online.org.uk/Variorum/1860/1860-215-c-1859.html
When examined as it is, out of context, it appears that this quote from Darwin’s On the Origin of Species, is talking about the attachments that dogs form with people. We’ll address this interpretation first and then later go back and look at the quote in context.
There has been some controversy over the years about whether the dog’s ability to form attachments to people is instinctive or learned. Early animal behaviorists believed, like Darwin, that dogs evolved this ability as a result of domestication, because at the time they believed that wild animals wouldn’t form these attachments, even though they might be tamed.
Darwin clearly believed that instinctive behavior was inherited, genetically determined and mostly unlearned. As we’ve talked about in webinars and articles on genetics and behavior, this is a misunderstanding of how behavior develops in animals. All behavior is an interaction of genetic predispositions and environmental influences. The term “instinctive” sets up a false dichotomy between nature and nurture and has largely been abandoned by animal behaviorists.
Darwin can be forgiven for not knowing this at the time (1859), because virtually nothing was known about genetics and development of behavior. But research done in the middle part of the 20th century showed that dogs aren’t born “loving” people, but develop the ability to form attachments to people as a result of early socialization experiences with people. Without them, dogs are fearful and intolerant of close contact with people. This is not what we would consider loving behavior. We talked in detail about this in the BEN webinar “The Scientific Basis of Socialization in Dogs and Cats.”
The original context for Darwin’s quote was a discussion about how the behavior of our domestic animals has changed through the process of domestication and not really about the love or attachment that dogs have to people.
The quote in context is “Familiarity alone prevents our seeing how universally and largely the minds of our domestic animals have been modified by domestication. It is scarcely possible to doubt that the love of man has become instinctive in the dog. All wolves, foxes, jackals, and species of the cat genus, when kept tame, are most eager to attack poultry, sheep and pigs;… How rarely, on the other hand do our civilized dogs, even when quite young, require to be taught not to attack poultry, sheep, and pigs!” (1859, p.215)
So Darwin thought that our dogs express their love of people by not attacking our other domestic animals. As he admits, in his time as in the present, dogs do attack other domestic animals, but it appears that they do it less than wild predators. To our knowledge, no one has ever gathered evidence in support of that supposition so we can’t be sure. But if it is true, it is an oversimplification to attribute it solely to genetic changes occurring through domestication. There likely have been changes in dog social behavior as the result of genetic selection during domestication. Just exactly what those changes are, are a matter of some debate.
To sum up, we would not conclude that dogs’ “love of man” is “instinctive” as Darwin held. The tendency or propensity to form close social relationships with people may have a genetic basis but certain early environmental experiences are required for that tendency to be expressed. And secondly we don’t know if a reduction in predatory behavior in dogs is related to dogs’ attachment or love for people as Darwin supposed. So on the truth meter, this quote gets a zero.
This article was based on another one in the  series “Some Popular Sayings About Dogs – How True Are They?” which appeared in the members-only section of the Behavior Education Network. Learn more about all the educational resources about pet behavior available in BEN by clicking on the “Home” button at the top of this page.