Overview
- In Science on January 8, researchers from Eötvös Loránd University and the University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna detailed tests on dogs with unusually large toy-name vocabularies.
- In experiments with 10 Gifted Word Learner dogs, 7 learned new object labels by overhearing conversations, mirroring performance seen in 18-month-old children.
- Early test accuracy was high, with 100% correct choices after overheard exposure versus 80% after direct teaching, despite about eight minutes of total label exposure per condition.
- A discontinuity task showed dogs could link names to objects even when labels were spoken after the toy was hidden, and most retained the words for at least two weeks.
- Control trials with typical dogs showed no comparable learning from overheard speech, and the authors emphasize the ability is extremely rare as they recruit more participants.