Thursday, July 28, 2011

Deception in pets

Have you ever wondered how smart your dog really is? Do you question if your pet understands the words you are saying, or if he is simply reacting to your tone of voice?Most dogs have the mental abilities of a two-year old child. They can understand up to 150 words and can count to 4 or 5. If you compare this to most other animals, this is considered pretty smart in the Animal Kingdom.These are all amazing things for a dog to be able to do, but they are also able to do one more thing: consciously deceive their owners! This final characteristic can prove troublesome, as many a dog owner can attest. I’d say the trickiest part of this possibility is the requirement that a dog would have to hold a memory in his mind for a considerable period of time and, then, continue to experience the emotion associated with something that happened in the past.

Has your own dog been smart enough to deceive you? How did he/she do it?


Alice England
Makingstuffwithlove

PS: The winner from last week's word search puzzle give away is: Jenya2. Congrats to her.

8 comments:

Three Wishes Collective said...

Definitely! When we're downstairs and she wants upstairs, she'll sit at the top of the step like she's looking outside, then she'll get all excited and run up and down the steps barking her head off like she sees something out there. So, I let her upstairs to see what it is, and its nothing. She doesn't even go to a window to look outside, she just goes in the living room to lay on the couch. If she had really seen something outside, she would have run to the window when we came up and continued to bark. So, she's just doing it to come upstairs.

Astrid Nicole Etcetera said...

I can't think of one time Astrid has ever been deceptive, but I do love this post. Our dogs are our constant source of entertainment. It is so fun to try to figure out how their minds work.

SassySashadoxie said...

Sasha is a dachshund-They are deceptive by nature. heehee.

1.) When she was a puppy, she wanted on the chair where I was sitting but by herself not in my lap. She looked at me then went to the back door like she wanted out. Then woofed, looked at me, and sat by the back door. I got up to let her out and she ran back into the living room and up on the chair I was sitting in. Like thanks that is exactly what I wanted.

2. Then, the garbage getting into. She once got into a small trash can when she didn't know I was watching her. I made a sound and she tried scooting the tissues back into the can with her nose that were laying on the floor. When I came by she looked guilty and then gave me the oh I am so cute look. She is such a stinker.

3. Scooting a small step latter over to a cabinet, climbing up, knocking a treat container off the cabinet. I caught her on the latter and she jumped down and was looking at me like what it just fell. heehee.

Giupetto and Gianna Tails said...

First of all congrats to Jenya! I see you added the winner to the post.

This is such an interesting post. Now I am going to be watching my dogs for deceiptfulness. LOL I can't think of any.

My dogs DO understand lots of words. Like when I explain where Giupetto left his toy, he understands which room or where I am describing.
Maybe some deceipt comes into play when he pretends he has lost his toy and makes me look for it. I think HE gets a laugh out of it. LOL

Gianna knows she is doggie #2. LOL

I loved reading your stories Athena and Shari. That is so cute.

Giupetto and Gianna Tails said...

Athena, actually more than cute, Sasha is amazing. Trying to hide the mess, and also the ladder thing.
Shari, your's is so similar to Athena's first one.

Art and Sew Forth said...

I can't remember if my dogs have been deceitful or not. Well....I do remember several times when they would hear me coming and you would hear little thud...as they jumped off the couch before I go there! LOL!

PaniEva said...

My greyhound Pani loves walks. One day, knowing there was something more interesting happening at home, she didn't want to go. She was dragging her feet and looking back. Then she started gagging and coughing. I stopped, rubbed her throat, patted her back and continued walking. After less than a minute she started gagging again. I repeated rubbing and patting and continued our walk. She started again. I realized she was just playing me and told her to cut it and that she was fine. All the gagging and coughing stopped immediately, not a sound for the rest of the walk! It happened in the past that I cut the walk short when she was not feeling well. That's what she must have been trying to achieve this time;)

doodypops said...

wow! these are great stories! i remember my first cairn Simon would see me eating dinner and run to the door barking like mad as if someone was there, tilting his head and everything as if he really heard something. The first few times I fell for it and when I got back to the table he was trying to steal my dinner.
I guess he was the smarter of the 2 of us!