NEW YORK (AP) — Dogs are great at learning action commands like “sit” and “stay,” but they are less good at remembering the names of things, like what their squeaky or stuffed toys are called.
Scientists know of about 50 gifted word-learner dogs that can retain the names of hundreds of toys, though they are not yet sure what is behind the pups’ wordy skills. New research is pushing the limits of what these dogs can do.
Scientists already knew the extraordinary pups could learn the names of their stuffed pizza and doughnut toys from playtime with their owners. In the latest study, the researchers found that the pups can also understand new names by eavesdropping.
The study involved 10 gifted dogs, including a Border collie named Basket and a Labrador named Augie. The dogs watched their owners hold a new toy and talk to another person about it, and then the pups were told to go to another room to retrieve that specific toy from a pile of many others.
Seven out of the 10 dogs successfully learned the names of new toy items described as stingrays and armadillos from passively listening to their owners.
The pups even succeeded when the owners put the toy in an opaque box and then spoke to another person about it, creating a disconnect between seeing the object and hearing its name.
“This is the first time that we see a specific group of dogs that are able to learn labels from overhearing interactions,” said study author Shany Dror with Eötvös Loránd University in Hungary and the University of Veterinary Medicine in Austria.
Dror said the animals were fully grown, so the brain mechanisms enabling them to eavesdrop are likely different from those of humans. The report noted that only a few other animals, like parrots and apes, have demonstrated a knack for this kind of eavesdropping, and that it is also essential to human development: children under age 2 can pick up new words from listening, including ones their parents may not have intended.
Animal cognition expert Heidi Lyn with the University of South Alabama said the new work shows how “animals have a lot more going on cognitively than maybe you think they do.” Lyn had no role in the study, which was published Thursday in the journal Science.
The report cautioned that not all dogs pick things up like this, and said it is unlikely your furry friend is learning names while snacking on leftovers under the dinner table.
Dror said she hopes to keep studying the gifted pooches and figuring out what cues they are picking up on, and she described the dogs as enthusiastic — and messy — research subjects. “We do have dogs coming to the lab sometimes, which is really nice,” she said, “but then often someone pees on the couch. So that does happen.”
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