Imagine this scenario: you’re rushing out of the house when you realize you don’t have your keys. You’re in a hurry and do not have time for this. You look everywhere while your toddler, dog, and cat watch you panic. Which of these three do you think will be the most helpful when your anxiety runs the highest?

An experiment run by researchers at Eötvös Loránd University in Budapest, Hungary, asked this exact question. And while their findings might not be too surprising for some, others may find that their own experience shows otherwise. Either way, online commenters are having a blast with the whole thing.

Cats vs. dogs vs. toddlers

The animal behavior study, co-authored by Melitta Csepregi, Anna Ágnes Moravcsik, Ádám Miklósi, and Márta Gácsi, is titled “Dogs’ behaviour is more similar to that of children than to that of cats in a prosocial problem situation.” The idea was to compare toddlers, dogs, and cats in terms of their “pro social behavior.”

Of utmost importance, the study found that all three species cared…at least a little. “All species were attentive toward the searched object or distressed caregiver,” the study notes. But what stood out, hence the title of the research paper, was that dogs and toddlers were similar in showing “spontaneous pro-social behavior.” Cats, on the other hand, were a tad more self-serving. “Cats mainly showed object-related behaviors when it was in........

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