Is your dog a genius?

February 5, 2021 12:01 PM

Source link: The Conversation. Anyone who has lived with a dog will know their capacity for learning the meaning of words, even ones you don’t want them to know. How many times have you had to spell the words “walk” or “dinner” in the hope of avoiding an explosion of excitement? Previous studies have investigated how non-human animals, including chimpanzees, sea lions and rhesus monkeys, learn words. But now a paper published in Nature shows some dogs learn the name of a new object after hearing it only four times, an ability previously thought to be confined to humans.
posted by Bella Donna (16 comments total)

My feisty Corgi girl, Bessie, knew at least 25 toy names. She also knew which of her 5 footballs was her Saints football and she dropped it at our feet during games so we would play with her. We trained her right. Who Dat!!! My sweet Corgi boy, Rocky, was not toy oriented at all but he was very happy to slobber all over us when we spelled many food oriented words because he was not fooled by our pitiful methods. My sweet Shih Tzu/Aussie mix is just learning our ways because he is a fairly recent rescue. But he somehow knows when I am going to the front of the house with the intention of walking him even when I think I am giving nothing away about my plans. (Working at home is really spoiling him.)
posted by narancia at 12:25 PM on February 5, 2021 [7 favorites]

Why yes, my dog IS a genius! Thank you for noticing 😁
posted by rue72 at 12:46 PM on February 5, 2021 [14 favorites]

I think not. He told me that he was working on translating John Milton into Latin, to pass the time while waiting for me to wake up in the mornings. I looked at his work, and there were just all kinds of errors in the cases.
posted by thelonius at 12:52 PM on February 5, 2021 [15 favorites]

They never met my dog. She was *just* smart enough to associate knocking with someone at the door, but never grasped the causality behind it. I could send her barking to the front door by rapping on a table while she was watching me.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 12:54 PM on February 5, 2021 [19 favorites]

However, their memory decayed considerably after 10 minutes and almost completely after one hour.

Oh, maybe they *did* meet my dog.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 1:00 PM on February 5, 2021 [8 favorites]

Our dog has never learned the names of any of her toys, despite repeated sustained efforts to teach her. She likes her toys, and will pick whatever one pleases her when she wants to play, but she has no idea which one is which (we usually voice her saying things like "what the hell's a squirrel?" when we encourage her to get a particular toy). I've never encountered a dog who didn't know their toys' names before - my previous pup knew a whole huge basket full of them.

Moe is otherwise very smart, is uncanny at picking up on cues and signals we don't even realize we're giving off, and knows a lot of words we didn't deliberately teach her - but apparently she learns on her own terms, and apparently the names of her toys are just not relevant to her.

As a speech-language pathologist, there's part of me that feels this is all just a grave and embarrassing failure on my part - my own "kid" doesn't know object labels! - but it's also kind of interesting to get this insight into what my dog does or does not think is worth her time to learn.
posted by DingoMutt at 1:07 PM on February 5, 2021 [10 favorites]

Not surprising, we loved playing this game with our Boxers. Both knew at least a half dozen toys by name (we didn't have budget, room nor time for 45!) - not much cuter than saying, "Go get your fish!"or "Where's your rabbit?" or "Let's play Squeaky Man!" and see him madly search the first floor, then up the stairs and room to room - sometimes gone so long you thought maybe he'd gotten distracted - before bounding back down with that beaming proud look in his eyes, "Here's my damn rabbit!".
posted by thecincinnatikid at 1:08 PM on February 5, 2021 [13 favorites]

My one dog knows the name of a number of his toys, which is fun. But damn the thing he excels at is recognizing the motors of a Fedex or UPS truck. Wouldn't be so bad, except I live in a spot where they're constantly going by or doing a last minute package sort in the minimall next door.
posted by drewbage1847 at 1:22 PM on February 5, 2021 [5 favorites]

some dogs learn the name of a new object after hearing it only four times

Holy smokes, no wonder! I am going to have to take a w... a perambulation around the neighborhood! to digest this information and think about just how smart our our little companion is!! Are chihuahuas in possession of infinitely-folded walnut-sized brains, or maybe I'm just wasting 99.999% of what I've got?
posted by riverlife at 2:33 PM on February 5, 2021 [2 favorites]

Chihuahuas, like my four, are highly evolved and attuned to learning their environment to stay safe. Somehow the jerks can hear me put on socks all the way across the house and think that mean it's time for a "W"
posted by drewbage1847 at 3:25 PM on February 5, 2021 [6 favorites]

Anyone who follows Stella the dog at @hunger4words on Instagram knows how eloquent dogs can be. Stella's person, Christina Hunger, is a speech pathologist who more or less invented an AAC tablet that dogs could use to communicate. It's been an absolute joy watching Stella's sentences get more and more sophisticated. I'm eagerly awaiting Hunger's upcoming book, How Stella Learned to Talk, for more information about her training method.
posted by The demon that lives in the air at 3:40 PM on February 5, 2021 [6 favorites]

there were just all kinds of errors in the cases.

"It was the best of times, it was the blurst of times"?!?
posted by Greg_Ace at 4:41 PM on February 5, 2021 [3 favorites]

Chan was so, so smart with human words. I cycled through walk, W-A-L-K, code word, and promener. She learned them all. Secretly I loved her explosions of joy, and I was always amazed that she would pick up and retain every new routine way of referring to her favorite thing in the world, besides ball. Which I always just called ball.

She also learned the voice everyone in the family eventually used to imply "this is Chan talking," and I think she got sick of it. Like, ugh, these humans are trying to be me again, the things I put up with for kibble and cuddles and walks and ball.

I miss you baby girl.
posted by late afternoon dreaming hotel at 5:35 PM on February 5, 2021 [12 favorites]

Luce knows that when Herr Duck (working from home) puts on Real Pants, she's getting a walk!! She has never figured out how to spell W-a-l-k but she DOES know d-o-g-p-a-r-k (even though those days are in the past). She still recognizes names of her old d-o-g-p-a-r-k friends that she hasn't seen in 8 years!
posted by Gray Duck at 7:25 AM on February 6, 2021 [2 favorites]

Our dog loves spotting our transit trains (Light Rail Transit, or LRTs) and she recognizes the word 'LRT'.

That's weird, endearing, and I have no idea how that happened. It's also weird we figured out she recognized it.
posted by mazola at 9:23 AM on February 6, 2021 [3 favorites]

"Other breeds may simply be less interested in playing with or fetching toys. For example sight hounds, such as salukis and greyhounds, are primarily bred for hunting or racing, so are generally more difficult to train. They may show no interest in toys at all, as well as being considerably less motivated to please the handler."

In my experience sighthounds aren't even smart enough to turn toward me for petting. They lie down next to me, facing away, and then whine because I can't reach them.
posted by QuakerMel at 11:49 AM on February 13, 2021