SENSORY CAPACITIES AND INTELLIGENCE OF DOGS 



2.3 



which the dog was supposed to approach 

 in performing, with the following result: 



1. "Go put your head on the chair" — dog 

 jumps up on table at which Herbert is 

 looking. 



2.. "Jump over the chair, good dog" — dog goes 

 over to window at which Herbert is looking. 



3. "Go over to the door" — approaches table at 



which Herbert is looking. 



4. "Go over to the door now, I say" — goes to 



window slowly, toward which Herbert 

 has turned. 



5. "Go take a walk around the room" — dog 



goes to door at which Herbert is looking. 



Mr. Herbert was then blindfolded and 

 the test repeated to see whether Fellow 

 got his cue from watching his master's 

 eyes or from the general orientation of 

 head and body. Similar results were 

 now obtained showing that the latter 

 factor is most likely the important one. 



The dog was again tested as before with 

 all persons present behind screens, and 

 with similar results on November 4, and 

 November 10. Only two commands of 

 this order out of a total of 2.0 were properly 

 executed — less indeed than pure chance 

 should give. On their face these results 

 seem to show that Fellow does, and must 

 use visual cues in carrying out commands 

 of this type. It should be pointed out, 

 however, that not all items of the type 

 II were tried out under test conditions 

 and some of them would appear to be 

 much easier than others. This point did 

 not occur to us until we were analyzing 

 the data a few days ago, and it was then 

 too late to make further tests. The fact 

 that the dog did not fail at all on the 

 more than fifty different commands of 

 type I, even when these were given over 

 and over again along with the more difficult 

 sort, shows very clearly the ability of 

 the dog to form associations between 

 sounds, or verbal patterns, and definite 

 acts on his part. Furthermore, it will be 

 seen that the dog did very well indeed on 



the retrieving-objects test, which happens 

 to be the third item in our type II list, 

 but which was tested under a more natural 

 arrangement. We have the feeling that 

 if Mr. Herbert would use the screen ar- 

 rangement for a while in training the dog 

 until he became accustomed to performing 

 with his master out of sight, many if not 

 all of the commands of type II could be 

 carried out successfully without any visual 

 aids whatsoever. Even in the present 

 results, it is only the object, or place in 

 connection with which the act is to be 

 performed, and not the act itself that 

 seemed to require visual cues. It is more 

 than likely that a greater amount of practice 

 had been given the name-act associations 

 than the name-object, or name-place con- 

 nections and hence we should expect the 

 former to be more firmly fixed and more 

 easily utilized. 



The retrieving-objects test 



According to Mr. Herbert, a large 

 number of common objects and places are 

 known to Fellow by name. The partial 

 list which he gave us included the follow- 

 ing items : 



table, chair, pillow, bed, sofa, window, door, back 

 door, front door, car, truck, elevator, water, milk, 

 tree, wall, keys, brush, lady, gentleman, baby, boy, 

 little boy, big boy, girl, little girl, big girl, dog, cat, 

 puppy, shoes, baby's shoes, baby's doll, gloves, 

 package, hat, coat, dollar (silver), money (paper), 

 stick, ball, roof, fence, house, horse, post, lap (of 

 person), collar, strap (leash), bite (of food), foot, 

 head, mouth, paw, names of some 40 people and 

 other dogs in Detroit, etc. In addition he suppos- 

 edly recognizes certain terms of praise (good dog, 

 that's fine, that's right) and certain words indicating 

 blame (shame, that's no good). 



The retrieving-objects test was designed 

 to determine to what extent genuine name- 

 object associations had been formed as 

 he assumed. A number of familiar objects 

 were placed in a room in one corner of 



