Recent study has found that owners smell better to dogs than other people or dogs. Brain scans showed that an owner’s scent may affect the dog’s brain in a way a loved one’s fragrance causes a reaction in humans.

This study’s results may help improve service dogs’ selection and training process. Brain scans were done on 12 dogs, which were given five different scents. One scent was from the dog, an unknown dog, another dog in the same home, an unknown person and the owner. On analysis, the reward part of the brain showed stronger response to the scents of known people as compared to the scents of unknown people and known dogs.

Gregory Berns, director of the Centre for Neuropolicy at Emory University, led this study and said, “It's one thing when you come home and your dog sees you and jumps on you and licks you and knows that good things are about to happen.” He added, “In our experiment, however, the scent donors were not physically present. That means the canine brain responses were being triggered by something distant in space and time. It shows that dogs' brains have these mental representations of us that persist when we're not there.”

Berns noted that people have an emotional, immediate reaction when they catch the smell of someone they love. He said, “Our experiment may be showing the same process in dogs. But since dogs are so much more olfactory than humans, their responses would likely be even more powerful than the ones we might have.”