‘Paw’ndering the Mind of the Dog
“A dog is the only thing on earth that loves you more than you love yourself.” — Josh Billings
Dog owners, dog parents, dog lovers. There are many names for people that love dogs. Whether you’ve had one dog or fifteen, you’ve probably come to the conclusion that not all dogs are the same. You might be able to teach one dog how to shake a paw within a week, whereas another dog may never learn to do so no matter how hard you try to teach them. Why is that? Because all dogs learn things differently, and that has to do with how they think about things.
Dog brains are not wired like human brains, however, they do have many of the same areas of the brain, where they make connections to things they already know, process emotions, and regulate bodily processes. There are also things that humans do that dogs don’t, such as read or write, which means they do not think in words or symbols. Although, that doesn’t mean they don’t use mental representations for learning, hunting, and other thought processes.
In a study to examine the extent of a dog’s sense of smell, staff at the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History placed both search and rescue police dogs and family dogs together to have a sniff off. In a pre-test, the dogs were familiarized with two toys that he or she liked to retrieve. When the dogs were in the actual test, the staff would create a scent trail with one of the toys and at the end of the trail, there would be one of the two toys.
Researchers found that the dogs would hesitate if they found the toy they didn’t expect at the end of the trail, and sometimes would continue searching for the toy from the initial smell. The staff had concluded that the dogs would create a mental representation of the toy they smelled and expected to see at the end of the trail, and would be surprised when they found something different. On top of that, after approximately four rounds of this test, both the police dogs and family dogs were able to find the toy at the end in the same amount of time, showing that their sense of smell, after a certain amount of time, worked just the same.
In another study, researchers at the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History had dogs participate in a range of tests with minimal variations. The tests were reward-based, where the dogs would have to search for and retrieve either food or a toy behind one of two V-shaped fences. In some cases, the dogs would see where the treat or toy was placed, and in others, they would not.
The researchers found that when the dogs didn’t see the treat or toy placed, they would immediately hunt for more clues, such as looking through the cracks of the fence before making the trip around them. This told the researchers that the dogs are metacognitive to some capacity, which means that they strategize how to solve a problem, even when they don’t know everything about the problem and adapt their plan from there.
Research published in Frontiers for Neuroscience has been the first to attempt to sniff out what makes dogs unique when it comes to auditory commands and if that is, in fact, the best way to teach man’s best friend. How did they do this? Twelve adorable canines were trained in various tricks verbally, and then brought into an fMRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging) device, a noninvasive and safe way to measure brain activity by detecting changes in blood flow, where their owners conducted several experiments regarding toys and their matching names.
Researchers found that if the owners used gibberish to try and confuse their dogs about the toys, they would demonstrate increased activity in the auditory regions of the brain, meaning that the dogs were wanting to hear their owners and better understand them so they could obey them. Dogs know that when they listen to their owner, there is usually a reward for them in the end. Aside from that, there was additional corresponding brain activity that divided the dogs into various learning patterns.
Half of the dogs had shown the secondary activity in a part of the brain that processes language, much like humans. The other half of the dogs had shown a range of different activity from the emotional center of the brain to where memories are stored and processed. In short, the dogs either made an effort to process it like language they’ve heard before, create a memory that they could relate the word to, or associate a new, unrelated word with connection to the item they were familiar with. This confirms that dogs are problem solvers and wish to understand anything their owner throws at them, no matter how hard it is to figure out.
With so much diverse activity in the brain, it was concluded that auditory commands may not be the most successful or efficient way to training your dog to do tricks or other tasks. There are too many variables such as tone of voice and similarities to other words. The better senses to use would be sight, as they pick up visual prompts like gestures and other body language, or smell, as they have very sensitive noses.
Dogs have an incredibly advanced way of learning. They can use scent, visuals, and problem solving skills to work out every obstacle they face, even when they don’t have their owner to help them out. Dogs are intuitive and can even learn from each other. So why do dogs actually need us human beings? They don’t. They choose us. And that’s exactly why they are man’s best friend.
Emory Health Sciences. (2018, October 15). Scientists Chase Mystery of How Dogs Process Words. Retrieved November 21, 2018, from https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2018-10/ehs-scm101518.php
Kaye, R. (2010, November 18). Inside the Science of How Dogs Think. Retrieved November 30, 2018, from http://www.cnn.com/2010/LIVING/11/18/intelligent.dog.psychology/index.html
Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History. (2018, March 5). Ball or Stuffed Toy — Do Dogs ‘Know’ What They’re Smelling? Retrieved November 30, 2018, from https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2018-03/mpif-bos030518.php
Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History. (2018, November 19). Dogs Know When They Don’t Know. Retrieved November 30, 2018, from https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2018-11/mpif-dkw111918.php
Shiba Shake. (2010, March 04). How Dogs Learn, How Dogs Think. Retrieved November 30, 2018, from https://shibashake.com/dog/how-dogs-learn-how-dogs-think
