Watch a dog for sixty seconds and you will observe a stream of signals — a flick of the ear, a shift in weight, a brief lick of the lips. Most owners notice the obvious cues: the excited spin before a walk, the tucked tail after a scolding. What research increasingly shows is that the subtler signals matter just as much, and that learning to read them correctly is one of the most practical things an owner can do for their pet's wellbeing. More than a wagging tail Popular culture has long treated the wag as a universal sign of happiness, but veterinary behaviourists have documented a more nuanced picture. According to work published in Current Biology by researchers at the University of Trento, dogs wag more to the right (from the dog's own perspective) when they see something positive, such as their owner, and more to the left when they encounter something threatening. Other dogs appear to respond to the direction of the wag, displaying calmer behaviour in response to right-biased wagging and more anxious responses to left-biased wagging. Tail position compounds the message. A tail held high and stiff, even if moving, often signals high arousal or a challenge. A low, fast wag can indicate submission or uncertainty. A loose, mid-height sweep in a relaxed dog is broadly accepted by behaviourists as the friendliest combination of all. Stress signals owners routinely miss Norwegian dog trainer and behaviourist Turid Rugaas, whose work on what she termed "calming signals" has been widely cited in the applied behaviour literature, identified a cluster of behaviours that dogs use to de-escalate tension in themselves and others. These include yawning outside the context of tiredness, slow blinking, sniffing the ground when nothing is there, and turning the head or body away from a source of stress. Lip-licking — a quick tongue flick across the muzzle — is another signal commonly overlooked by owners who attribute it to hunger. In a non-food context, behavioural researchers