A study recently published in the journal, “Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews,” found that dogs can tell when someone is being rude or mean to another person. Like humans, dogs then use this information to decide how to treat people.
Source: Simplemost.
Dogs in the study reacted negatively to humans who refused to help their owners. “We discovered for the first time that dogs make social and emotional evaluations of people regardless of their direct interest,” said Kazoo Fujita, lead researcher for the Japanese study.
See also: How dogs process peoples’ emotions, Animal Health Digest, February 14, 2018.