Puppy Love: Oxytocin Plays A Part In Our Role With 'Man's Best Friend'

And they called it, puppy love. 

Turns out there's a bit of science behind why we melt whenever we see "man's best friend" walking down the street (and so does that dog!), with research based on several experiments--one that involved 30 owners and their dogs.

Researchers sampled the urine of both species before and after participant owners spent time with their dogs for a half-hour.

Afterward, study authors found that dogs who stared at their owners for over five minutes had higher levels of oxytocin, which can illicit bonding behaviors often experienced between a mother and child. 

However, when researchers tried to replicate the experiment in wolves, they did not find similar results, suggesting that dogs may have started to gaze at their owners during domestication as a means of communication.

Another experiment also showed that dogs stared at their owners longer if they received doses of oxytocin. Similarly, hormone levels went up in their owners as well. However, for some reason, the result was not quite the same in male and female dogs. For instance, male dogs didn't spend quite as much time looking into their owners' eyes when they were sprayed with the hormone.

"I had predicted that both domestic dogs and humans would show adaptations to enhanced non-verbal communication, but I had not thought of the oxytocin link," said Miho Nagasawa at Azabu University in Japan, via New Scientist. "As the first species to be domesticated, dogs have a very ancient and very profound link to humans that affected both of us."

Nagaswaw said she believes that this may suggest that as male oxytocin is known to increase hostility towards other group members, the spray could have potentially made male dogs more vigilant to their surroundings about strangers in the room during the experiment. However, more research is necessary to flesh out the information.

"Facing others is a threatening behaviour in other animals," she added

More information regarding the findings can be seen via the journal Science.