It's crazy to think that once upon a time researchers thought that our Pugs thought like a machine — which means they wouldn't have any emotional reactions at all! It's a good thing we've come a long way in researching and understanding a dog's mind. It turns out their emotions are a lot more complex than researchers first thought!

In the dim, distant past it was presumed that dogs had very rich mental lives, with feelings much like those of humans and even the ability to understand human language almost as well as people. However, with the rise of science things began to change.

Since much of the science of the time was sponsored by church-related schools and universities, it is not surprising to find that the researchers would not assert the existence of higher levels of mental functioning such as emotions in animals.

The most prominent person to adopt this line was the French philosopher and scientist René Descartes. In a highly influential set of analyses, Descartes suggested that animals like dogs were simply some kind of machine.

You might argue against this by noting that if you challenge a dog it clearly becomes angry, and this is proven by the fact that it snarls or snaps. Alternatively, it might become afraid, and this is proven by the fact that it whimpers and runs away.

Science has clearly progressed a long, long way beyond the thinking of Descartes and Malebranche. We have now come to understand that dogs possess all of the same brain structures that produce emotions in humans.
To understand what dogs feel, we must turn to research done to explore the emotions of humans. It is the case that not all people have the full range of all possible emotions, and, in fact, at some points in your life you did not have the full complement of emotions that you feel and express today.

Why is such data important to understanding emotional lives of our dogs? Researchers have now come to believe that the mind of a dog is roughly equivalent to that of a human who is two to two-and-a-half years old. This conclusion holds for most mental abilities as well as emotions.

The complex social emotions—those which have elements that must be learned—don’t appear until much later. Shame and pride take nearly three years to appear, while guilt appears around six months after that. A child is nearly four years of age before she feels contempt.

Dogs go through their developmental stages much more quickly than humans do and have all of the emotional range that they will ever achieve by the time they are four to six months of age (depending on the rate of maturation in their breed). This means that a dog will have all of the basic emotions: joy, fear, anger, disgust, and, yes, love, but the dog does not experience the more complex emotions like guilt, pride, and shame.

Many would argue that they have seen evidence indicating their dog is capable of experiencing guilt. Your dog has learned that when you appear and his droppings are visible on the floor, bad things happen to him. What you see is his fear of punishment; he will never feel guilt because he is not capable of experiencing it.

So what does this mean for those of us who live with and interact with dogs? The good news is that you can feel free to dress your dog in that silly costume for a party. He will not feel shame, regardless of how ridiculous he looks. But your dog can indisputably feel love for you and derive contentment from your company, and that’s really the crux of the matter, isn’t it?

It's nice to know that dogs do indeed experience the basic emotions of love, joy, fear, and anger. Modern Dog Magazine elaborates more on this intriguing topic. Besides, you probably guessed as much when you saw your Pug run towards you the moment you greeted him at the door. He was excited to see you and still is every time you get home! It's obvious that your Pug loves you and he wouldn't have it any other way. He's a loving pup that shows his emotions and it's a good thing that you can give him lots of love and praise in return!