Canine Einstein?

Every dog owner knows that dogs are smart. But a nine-year-old border collie named Rico is quickly making a name for himself as the Einstein of dogs. Not only does Rico understand 200 words, about the same number as a trained parrot or chimpanzee, but he is also able to learn some new words as easily as a three-year-old child.

Scientists are especially impressed by Rico's ability to figure out the names of objects that he has not been trained to recognize. In an experiment in Germany, scientists took seven of Rico's toys and placed them in a room along with one new toy whose name Rico did not know. Then they asked Rico's owner to call out the name of the new toy. In seven out of ten tries, Rico went into the room, figured out that the word he had never heard before must be the name of the toy he had never seen before, and brought the new toy to his owner. Amazingly, Rico still remembered the names of the new toys a month later, even though he'd heard them only once.

When human toddlers are learning language, they use their brains to figure out the meanings of many new words. Before Rico, scientists thought that only humans could learn a new word without being told what it means. But many dog owners say they aren't surprised by Rico's knack for human language. They always knew their pups understood them.

-Myra Awodey

Copyright Carus Publishing Company Oct 2004
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