Smarter dogs can learn new words after hearing them just four times. This is the conclusion reached by the Department of Ethology of the Eötvös Loránd University (Budapest). However, preliminary evidence seems to show that most dogs do not learn words (i.e. names of objects) unless they are very well trained.
The research team analyzed the behavior of exceptionally talented dogs who learn words in the absence of training, but who play with their owners on a normal daily basis. Additionally, the study has been published in Scientific Reports.
Gifted dogs
Two gifted dogs participated in the experiment. A Border Collie named Whiskey (from Norway) and a Yorkshire terrier named Vicky Nina (from Brazil). The scientists evaluated her ability to learn new words after hearing her only four times.
Although it is normal to think that dogs, like children, learn words mainly in a social context, in this study scientists have been able to demonstrate the ability of dogs to learn names of objects during a task based on exclusion. In the task, the dogs were faced with seven toys (which they already know and can identify) and a new toy that they do not know.
“We wanted to know under what conditions gifted dogs can learn new words. To check this, we exposed Whiskey and Vicky Nina to new words under two different conditions,” explained Claudia Fugazza, first author of the study. task-based and in a playful social context with their owners. Furthermore, in both conditions the dogs heard the name of the new toy only four times.
Study conclusions
In the exclusion-based task, dogs demonstrated that they could select the new toy when its owner said a new name, confirming that dogs can choose by exclusion. That is, they are able to exclude all other toys because they already have a name and select the only one that does not. However, when the scientists analyzed the dogs’ ability to recognize the toy by name (changing the real name to an equally novel fake one) they were able to observe that the dogs failed.
The other condition, the social one, where the dogs played with their owners while they spoke the name of the toy, turned out to be much more successful. In fact, the dogs quickly learned the name of the toy, even after hearing it only 4 times. Whiskey and Vicky Nina were able to select the toys by name without any inconvenience after learning the names in this way.
Thus, according to Adam Miklósi, ethologist and co-author of the study, this learning is similar to the way in which children acquire vocabulary around the age of two or three.
