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By Liz O'Connell
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A TikTok video of a golden retriever's reaction when he spotted another animal getting carried into the vet's office quickly went viral, reaching over 17 million views.
The golden retriever named Duncan joined his owner for a day at work at Animal Imaging, an outpatient diagnostic imaging facility in Texas that offers services for dogs, cats, horses and some exotic animals. The veterinary team uses specialized equipment such as X-rays, CT scans, MRIs, and ultrasounds to help diagnose and treat animals.
With an incoming patient, the workers needed to put Duncan in a kennel to keep him out of the way. He obliged, as he still got a front row seat to the action, but Thursday's TikTok video posted to the facility's account, @animalimaging, showed the pup was not expecting what came through the door—a horse.
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Duncan's eyes lit up with a mixture of surprise and concern. He looked at the horse being carried into the room and whipped his head around to see if anyone else noticed, but only for a second. Duncan focused once again on the entirely unfamiliar, giant animal.
The video's caption read: "Just checking that y'all are seeing this too?"
A representative from Animal Imaging told Newsweek via TikTok that the horse was brought into the facility for an MRI of its foot. When Duncan saw the horse, its body was upside down. A device held its legs up as the team rolled the horse to the table.
"It had drugs on board, so not in any pain and on its way to anesthesia," the representative said.
Duncan's reaction was as expected as he's known to be the "very expressive staff pet." Plus, this was his first time seeing a horse. But it also aligns with recent research.
A 2023 study published in The Royal Society found that dogs look longer and show greater pupil dilation when something happens that defies their expectations. In this experiment, dogs watched as an object was hidden behind a screen and then either reappeared, as expected, or failed to appear again. Researchers tracked the dogs' eyes. When the event didn’t go as the dogs anticipated, their eyes lingered.
In Duncan's case, the sudden arrival of the horse went against what he expected for another day at work with his owner. The change in his normal stunned him, forcing him to look longer with wider eyes.
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TikTok Users React
The TikTok video became an instant hit among users who were obsessed with the surprised look on Duncan's face.
"Side eye speaks, 'Are we going to address the horse in the room?'" joked one user.
A second added: "I feel this is the equivalent of hearing a kid scream at the dentist right before it’s your turn."
Feeling for the dog, a third user wrote: "To be fair, I ALSO was NOT expecting a horse."
A fourth user commented: "The way he looked around is absolutely frying me."
Another user posted: “'That the biggest dog I’ve ever seen.'”
Do you have funny and adorable videos or pictures of your pet you want to share? Send them to life@newsweek.com with some details about your best friend, and they could appear in our Pet of the Week lineup.
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