Domestication
Human hunter-gatherers and wolves experienced several overlaps as both are social species, they shared habitat and hunted the same prey. There are several theories to explain possible routes for domestication of the dog:
Orphaned wolf-cubs: Studies have shown that some wolf pups taken at an early age and reared by humans are easily tamed and socialized.[2] Once these early adoptees started breeding amongst themselves, a new generation of tame "wolf-like" domestic animals would result which would over generations of time, become more dog-like.
The Promise of Food/Self Domestication: Early wolves would, as scavengers, be attracted to the bones and refuse dumps of human campsites. Dr. Raymond Coppinger of Hampshire College, Massachusetts, argues that those wolves that were more successful at interacting with humans would pass these traits onto their offspring, eventually creating wolves with a greater propensity to be domesticated. Coppinger believes that a behavioral characteristic called "flight distance" was crucial to the transformation from wild wolf to the ancestors of the modern dog. It represents how close an animal will allow humans (or anything else it perceives as dangerous) to get before it runs away. Animals with shorter flight distances will linger, and feed, when humans are close by; this behavioral trait would have been passed on to successive generations, and amplified, creating animals that are increasingly more comfortable around humans. "My argument is that what domesticated—or tame—means is to be able to eat in the presence of human beings. That is the thing that wild wolves can't do."[3] Furthermore, selection for domesticity had the side effect of selecting genetically related physical characteristics, and behavior such as barking. Hypothetically, wolves separated into two populations – the village-oriented scavengers and the packs of hunters. The next steps have not been defined, but selective pressure must have been present to sustain the divergence of these populations.