Dogs actually tilt their head out of curiosity rather than an air of confusion.
RTE's Ryan Tubridy was amazed by the finding after a study was conducted in Hungary and released in recent days.
A new paper published in Animal Cognition found that a group of dogs labelled "gifted word learners" all tilted their heads far more frequently than their non-gifted counterparts after hearing a command.
The data showed that the gifted learners tilted their heads 43% of the time, while the other 33 dogs did the gesture just 2% of the time.
Shany Dror, an animal cognition researcher at Eötvös Loránd University in Hungary who co-authored the study, said: "It seems that there is a relationship between success in retrieving a named toy and frequent head tilts upon hearing its name. That is why we suggest an association between head-tilting and processing relevant and meaningful stimuli."
And Tubs was amazed by these findings having previously thought it was a sign of confusion.
He told his RTE listeners: "Researchers in Hungary found that this habit indicates your dog is listening intently to you.
"It means that, while it give off the air of confusion, he's actually curious....it's a sign of raised attention."
Does your dog ever tilt their head? Let us know.
