Lots of people say that their dogs are dumb, but then they never make the connection between their dog putting a paw up on your leg and getting a treat. The dog is deliberately doing something to get himself a treat, and how dumb can that make him?
The relationship between dogs and humans goes back thousands of years, and one reason that it has been so successful is because we communicate in a way that they understand. Consider your dog bringing a tennis ball to lay at your feet. Without any words being said, you know that it is time to play fetch!
These are just two examples of the way that your dog tells you what is going on in his mind, and you'll find that they are not the only way that they engage in complex behavior.
Just like humans do, dogs relate to each other and to us through body language and posture, but the way that we process it and the way that we do is very different.
Their eyes will take in light and color differently than we do, and they can see in low light much more easily. Thanks to the muscles on their head, they can rotate their ears to figure out where the sounds are coming from, and let's not forget that great sense of smell.
These basic differences will tell you a lot about how different their mental functioning is. They understand cause and effect, but it's much different from how we understand it.
Consider classical training, where you learn to associate a stimulus with a response. This is something that humans can ignore pretty easily. For instance, we can shake off an undesired response to a car accident or a visit to a doctor much more easily than a dog can.
Operant conditioning is where we learn about cause and effect through positive and negative reinforcement and is something that is even more different between humans and dogs.
Consider the fact that I always go out the back door with my Golden Retrievers when we are going to play fetch. Whenever we go out that door, we play fetch. On the other hand, when I let them out the side door, I don't go with them; I just leave them for half an hour or so. Of course, they always go to the back door when they want a game or see one coming.
When I train my dogs, I use a very specific tone and hand gesture to go along with the command. This gives them all kinds of cues and I can expect them to sit, stay down, no-bite, fetch, release, come and even eliminate at a single command.
However, on the other hand, I still cannot prevent them from eating something off of the floor because they cannot connect the bellyache a few hours later with the food that they ate before. This is just something that takes too much time.
What you should take from this information is that your dog, whether he is a Shepherd, a Retriever, a Basset Hound or a Dachshund, can learn a lot, if only you remember that he is a dog and not a human!
For instance, one fairly well-known woman has taught her dogs how to dance on command for the show circuit, and rescue dogs can locate children and pull them out of dangerous situations. Service dogs are incredible when they can do things as different as opening a door, pulling a wheelchair or even fetching a container of water without spilling a bit of it.
Just keep in mind, though that they are not people, and that there are some doggy activities that you cannot train out of them!
About the Author:
Ryan Rivollier has spent years in the Dog Training and Care field. Make sure you choose the best Dog Bedding for your dog. Get a totally unique version of this article from our article submission service
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