Israeli researcher finds that by eavesdropping, 'genius' dogs learn words like toddlers
The Times of Israel • • world
Key Points:
- A study published in Science by Israeli researcher Shany Dror reveals that Gifted Word Learner (GWL) dogs can learn new object names by overhearing their owners’ conversations, similar to 18-month-old human toddlers.
- The research involved 41 GWL dogs, primarily border collies, who demonstrated 90% accuracy in fetching toys whose names they learned either directly or through eavesdropping, highlighting their advanced social cognitive skills.
- Experiments showed that dogs could associate toy names with objects even when the naming occurred out of their sight, suggesting that some cognitive skills related to language learning predate human language itself.
- The Genius Dog Challenge, a citizen science initiative, helped identify these gifted dogs worldwide, with some dogs having
