Over the years, Stanley Coren has judged his fair share of owner-dog look-alike contests for charity in Vancouver. The results, Coren says, are “rather hilarious” — like the time a pudgy man showed up with a pug, the two sharing a striking resemblance.
It was only later Coren learned the man had cheated. He had borrowed the pug from a neighbour.
But even without cheating, Coren, a professor emeritus at the University of British Columbia’s psychology department and author of more than a dozen books about dogs, has found evidence to suggest human-dog resemblance is a real thing.
It’s not just something made up, used to poke fun at friends and sell Fido cellphones in the 1990s, according to recent research. In 2004, one study asked participants to match photos of dogs and owners; they did so successfully for purebred dogs most of the time. The next year, a similar study found participants did better than random chance at correctly matching the owner to their dog.
And a decade later, a study found judges were mostly able to match dogs with their owners, even when only the eyes of each were visible.
The explanation, laid out last year by German researchers in a review of 15 studies, revolves around two theories: similarity because of choice, or similarity over time.
Do we pick dogs that look like us?
Evidence suggests owners choose dogs that look like them.
In psychology, the mere exposure effect is the idea that things people see more of, they are more likely to like. And whether it’s in mirrors, reflections or photographs, people see their own face all the time.
“People just like stuff that they’re familiar with,” said Jim Davies, director of the Science of Imagination Laboratory at Carleton University, “and people see themselves a lot.”
With this in mind, Coren gathered a group of female participants in 1999 and asked them to judge the appearance of dogs. He found women with short hair tended to prefer dogs with short ears, while women with longer hair tended to prefer dogs with long ears.
These results, Coren said, could apply to face shape, nose size and other features, helping explain why people look like their dogs.
“People look like their dogs because they select dogs that vaguely look like them,” said Coren, former host of the “Good Dog!” TV show.
Do dogs become more like us over time?
Dogs could also come to look more like their owners over time — but the evidence is mixed.
In 2009, researchers in the Netherlands found overweight dogs tended to have owners with a higher body mass index, and the longer the duration of ownership, the more overweight the dogs became. “It indicates that owners might apply their personal attitudes and behaviour to their pets,” the researchers wrote.
The problem, according to Davies, is that in studies where participants are asked to match owners and dogs, the length of ownership seems to make no difference in their success.
What about personality?
Besides just looking alike, research indicates that dogs tend to act like their owners, too.
Two separate studies, one from the U.S. and one from Hungary, showed more extraverted owners have more extraverted dogs. Another study found a strong relationship between owners and dogs on all five personality dimensions — neuroticism, extraversion, conscientiousness, agreeableness and openness.
Regardless of their dogs’ personalities, neither Davies — owner of a half-chihuahua, half-papillon — nor Coren — owner of a Nova Scotia duck tolling retriever — think their dog looks like them.
“I’ve been bald for too long,” Coren said.
