Dogs have topped an RSPCA poll of the animals we’d most like to chat to, if we had the power.

While we love to see their tails wag, four in ten British people would like to have a chin-wag with our canine pals. Cats came second, with two in ten people choosing them, ahead of animals like chimpanzees, pigeons, foxes, chickens and cows.

However, nearly three in ten people say they wouldn’t like to talk to animals at all – and there’s no guarantee they’d like to talk to us, either!

Professor Daniel Mills, an animal expert at the University of Lincoln, told the RSPCA’s Animal Futures podcast: “Does your cat want to have a conversation with you? I don’t think so. He’s not interested in what’s on my mind!”

Professor Mills has been researching how AI can be used to read cats’ facial expressions, making it easier for us to understand them. In other breakthroughs, AI has been able to decode the calls of sperm whales and translate the oinks of pigs to tell us how they’re feeling.