There is plenty of evidence that animals experience primary emotions – happiness and fear, for example. But empirical evidence of the secondary – such as jealousy, pride, and guilt – is extremely rare in scientific literature. They usually say that such feelings are associated with self-awareness, which animals are deprived.
Nevertheless, Charles Darwin drew attention to the fact that the behavior associated with guilt is observed in some socialized primates – for example, lowering the head, avoiding eye contact. On the one hand, this is not surprising, because guilt serves to strengthen social relations and minimizes the possibility of crimes against partners. Similar behaviours were later discovered in other social animals, including wolves and domestic dogs.
