Pet Sounds
Is there a psychological explanation for perfectly sane people singing to their animal friends?
"OOMPA LOOMPA HIGGEDY HOG
You are a small and excellent dog.
Oompa Loompa hoggedy hig
You are a dog who's not very big."
It had been years since Willy Wonka's miniature workforce had come to mind. And yet just a few days after Milo, a high-octane terrier mix, entered our household, I was Oompa-Loomping at him with gusto. Soon, my musical repertoire expanded, as I adapted lyrics by REM, Talking Heads, Amy Winehouse, and Monty Python ("Oh he's a Milo dog and he's OK/He sleeps all night and he poops all day").
Was I out of my mind? Milo seemed to think so, as do about half of my pet-owning friends. Confess to people that you sing to your pet, and you will get one of two responses: "You . . . sing to your dog, do you?" as they edge slowly away, or a joyously relieved "I thought I was the only person who did that!" - sometimes accompanied by a full-throated rendition of their favorite pet song. Google the phrase "sing to" and either "cat" or "dog," and you'll find just how many pet singers are out there and how utterly delighted they are when they find one another. Reactions from the pets themselves are more mixed. Milo is indifferent, but some folks - especially cat owners - swear that their pets will tail-twitch along in rhythm, or even join in.
Why do we sing to our pets? Why do we sing? Why do we have pets? A simple question turns out to be a veritable Russian doll of odd behaviors nested inside one another. Music is one of the most basic of human activities, yet psychologists still argue over why we invented it and why it has an almost mystical power to draw groups together (from monks chanting plainsong to a techno rave). Why do we love our pets? From a Darwinian perspective, it hardly makes sense to lavish attention and resources on another species. Is today's pet-keeping merely a decadent holdover from a time when cats and dogs had utilitarian value - killing rats, pulling sleds, rescuing Timmy? Or did "survival of the cutest" result in the big-eyed, large-headed, irresistible pets of today that evoke our deepest caretaking instincts?
Because it seems we sing to our pets for the same reason we sing to babies - whatever that is. My informal survey suggests that pet singers were themselves sung to a great deal as children. Long ago, deep in our infant brains, a program got installed saying "Small helpless cute entity - sing to it." And sing we do, like manic cruise-ship entertainers, even when our pets gaze back at us with expressions of ennui, clearly thinking, "Less theater. More dinner."
Robin Abrahams, a Cambridge-based writer with a PhD in psychology, writes the "Miss Conduct" column in the Globe Magazine. Her first serious (i.e., post-ballerina phase) career goal was to be an animal behaviorist. E-mail her at missconduct@globe.com.
