Is Your Dog A Genius?

We all think our dogs are smart, but there was a show on national geographic last night that was all about just how smart our dogs really are.

The documentary starts off with an experiment done on monkeys to see if they can follow the human clue of a finger point. They would hide a treat under a cup and show the monkey two cups and point to one, the monkey didn’t get it. One of the researchers said his dog could do it, and that lead to a bunch of different tests with the dogs. They found that not only could they follow a pointing finger, even just an eye look in that direction would signal the dog. It was very interesting to see how much dogs can understand. In the show they explain how a dog has learned over time to read human body language and facial expressions, scientist say dogs are one of the worlds best associative learners. Dogs can pick up small clues that happen around them and associate it with human behavior. This is why your dog always knows you are about to leave the house before you go anywhere. They found that dogs can read human body language %90 of the time, even six month old puppies can read facial expressions.

This show is somewhat old, first aired in 2007, but it is still airing on national geographic channel. If you get a chance to watch it I highly recommend it. If you have already seen it let me know what you thought of it.