Dog Behavior Blog

The Eyes Have It --What Can Be Seen in a Dog's Eyes

Whether they are the mirror to the canine soul or not, dogs' eyes are worth attending to. They are an incredibly reliable part of a dog's body for ascertaining a dog's emotional state. As a professional behaviorist, I am always observing dogs for any clues about their emotional state or possible future behavior.

The eyes are one of the best places to go for this information. For example, dogs with dilated pupils are often fearful, unless of course low light levels offer another explanation for the eyes' appearance. The stereotypical frightened dog with eyes "wide as saucers" is a dog whose fear has resulted in dilated pupils. Another clue in the eyes of a dog who is afraid is when the dog is looking far to the side and the white part of the eye takes on a crescent shape.

When a dog turns his head away from you but his eyes are turned as far to the side as possible in your direction,the whites of his eyes take on that crescent shape. When a dog's eyes take on this appearance, professionals in the field refer to it as "whale eye." This visual sign is thought to occur because the dog is so afraid that he is not looking at you, but he's too afraid to take his gaze away from you entirely. The result is a dog who is looking at something with his eyes while not facing it. A dog who averts his gaze away from other individuals is often afraid as well.

There's a reason that the expression "puppy dog eyes" has positive connotations. Who doesn't like the soft warm look of a dog's eyes when they are relaxed, happy, and comfortable in their physical and social surroundings? Those eyes are generally recognized as friendly, and even loving.

In sharp contrast is the hard, cold, icy look that some dogs get. It is unknown what causes this harsh look, but most professional behaviorists associate this look with aggression, and my own observations seem to support the idea that dogs who exhibit this "hard eye" are more likely to bite than dogs who never get this look in their eye. If you have never seen this look, it can be hard to describe, other than to say that the dog's eyes get cold and icy looking, as though they are no longer a part of a living being. If you do see this look, you do not need to be told that the dog is not friendly, but rather, may be aggressive, because your body responds, even if your brain doesn?t process exactly what is happening. Even the first time a person sees a dog's eyes go hard, they usually get a nervous feeling in their stomach, or feel the hair on the back of their neck stand up. Dog expert or dog novice, a person seeing this visual signal is unlikely to feel comfortable approaching this dog or remaining in his presence.

An important thing to know about dog's eyes and their gazes is that dogs do not tend to look directly into the eyes of other individuals. In humans, this is a friendly and polite behavior, but in dogs it is rude and even threatening. Dogs can be taught to look at a person directly on cue, but it is not generally a natural behavior. Looking away with their head down is generally considered a deferential gesture, whereas looking away with the head turned up is used as a social signal that means the one performing this behavior is not currently available for social interaction. (For more information on look aways, review the August 20, 2007 blog entry.)

One last interesting note about dogs' eyes is that many old timers in the field of dog training think there is some truth to the saying, "Beware the dog with amber eyes." In my clinical practice with aggressive dogs, I have seen many dogs with amber eyes. Some, but not all, of them require caution, just like dogs with every other eye color. So, while I'm not convinced that there is any truth to the saying, I do always think of it whenever I meet a dog with amber eyes.

--Karen London

Dogs Have Different Retrieval Strategies

My Standard Poodle Raja loves to play ball. It is his favorite activity in the world, something that he could do all day if he found someone with the strength and endurance to keep throwing the ball for him. In Raja’s case, the ball is a football-shaped yellow rubber ball that looks like it was constructed out of Swiss cheese – most of the ball consists of air, enclosed by soft rubber struts. As Raja catches the ball, it squishes in his mouth, allowing him to chew it several times as he brings it back to me.

Sometimes I initiate the game by saying, “Where’s your ball? Go find your ball!” Raja then runs around the house looking for the ball, which could have been left anywhere. After a couple of minutes of searching, he triumphantly shows up with it, his tail wagging furiously. So from this, I know that he recognizes the word “Ball.” What I don’t know is how he searches for the ball. Does he look in each room systematically, or does he go to where he thinks the ball might have been left? I confess that I have never paid attention.

Now, however, there is an article in the April 2008 issue of Animal Cognition that suggests that dogs have different strategies for how they search for objects (Juliane Kaminski, Julia Fischer and Josep Call, 2008, Prospective object search in dogs: mixed evidence for knowledge of What and Where, Animal Cognition 11, 367-371, DOI 10.1007/s10071-007-0124-1).

The study involved two Border Collies, Rico and Betty, who each know the names of some 200 objects (see the previous post about Rico in this blog). The dogs’ searching strategies were tested in two experiments.

In one experiment, five or six objects were placed in each of two rooms in an apartment, and each dog was asked to retrieve a specific object, which could be in either room. The dogs were free to go into each room and search, until they found the object that they were asked to get. When they returned, they received either a treat or some playtime. Then they were asked to get the next object in each group, until all of the objects had been retrieved.

The first time the dogs entered each room, they could see all of the objects there. The question was, the next time they were asked to get a particular object, would they go right away into the correct room and bring it, or would they randomly roam through both rooms until they found the requested object?

Both dogs did very well at retrieving the correct objects. Rico brought the right object in 46 out of 48 times, and Betsy brought the right object in 38 out of 40 times.

However, the dogs had different retrieval strategies. Rico tended to go straight away to the room where the requested object was located, while Betsy tended to go first to the room where the object was NOT located.

Because Betsy had a different search behavior, the experimenters wanted to find out more about how she searched, So the second experiment revolved around Betsy. In this experiment, four rooms were used. The dog was in one room, while the experimenters placed a different object into each of two other rooms, while the fourth room remained empty. Then one of the experimenters took Betsy on a leash through each room each time before she was asked to retrieve an object. In the first set of 12 requests, Betsy was taken through the rooms in the same, consistent order, first room 1, then room 2, and then room 3. In the next set of 12 requests, the experimenter took Betsy through the rooms in a random order, with the sequence of rooms changing each time. In all of her walks through the rooms on a leash, Betsy could see each of the objects that had been placed there, one of which she would be requested to bring after her walk.

As before, Betsy tended to start her search in a room where the requested object was not located. However, the experimenters observed that Betsy had a preferred search pattern. She tended to start looking each time in one particular room (for example, the kitchen) and then moved on to another room (for example, the hallway), rather than going straight to the room that had the requested object.

These experiments show that the two Border Collies had two different search strategies. Rico went directly to the object. Betsy was much more systematic, starting her search in a particular place and systematically searching room after room until she found the object.

Why did Betsy start looking in a room that did not have the object? We can speculate that if the object were prey, it would be unlikely to stay in one place, and a systematic search would be more efficient than going straight to where the object had been when last seen.

Alternatively, we can speculate that Rico is much more bold and cut-to-the-chase, while Betsy is more ploddingly systematic.

---Con Slobodchikoff

What Is Life Like For Dogs In Nicaragua?

I recently returned from a two-week trip to Ometepe Island in Nicaragua to conduct ecological and behavioral field research on insects with 15 undergraduate and graduate students. Although we were primarily studying insects and plants, it was impossible to ignore the dogs that roamed all around the island on which we worked. Everything about their lives and about their appearance, too, was so different from the dogs we are accustomed to seeing here in the United States.

Almost all of the dogs on Ometepe Island were unbelievably skinny with ribs and hipbones sticking out, almost grotesquely in some cases. They have no owners and no families and no particular people to take care of them. None receive veterinary care of any kind, and the hope of help for behavioral problems is even more remote. They scavenge food wherever they can find it: in garbage, from the forest in the form of fruits, insects, and carrion, and they beg tourists for food. In fact, the only dogs I saw who looked properly fed were the few that hung out at either the biological station at which we worked, or the hostel where we spent a few nights. Both of these places have a regular influx of people from countries in which dogs are considered family members and these visitors feed the dogs.

Many of the females have frequent litters of puppies. One emaciated female had a litter of four-week old puppies when I was there in July 2007, and she had a new litter of about five or six weeks old pups in March 2008. Both times, she whelped in the hollow base of a tree trunk along a path that we nicknamed, appropriately enough, the puppy trail. These puppies, as well as the adult dogs living on the island are exposed to all sort of biting and stinging insects, scorpions, ticks, and the extreme heat and humidity of the tropics.

On the other hand, there are advantages in the lifestyle of these dogs, too. Unlike so many of our own pampered pets, these dogs get to be outside a lot, and they are certainly not bored. I’m not saying the trade-off is worth it, as clearly many of these dogs suffer greatly in terms of health, nutrition, and quality of life, but I do want to point out some advantages, too. There is something to be said for having to work for a living, and these dogs are indeed doing that. I just wish more of them had greater success at it.

Perhaps because their lives are so preoccupied with a never-ending quest to get enough food, I observed very little play behavior, even among young dogs who were regularly seen together. Play tends to occur only when other, more immediate needs have already been met, and in familiar situations in which animals are comfortable. When animals must spend all of their time searching for food or other resources, there is no time for play. The only dogs I ever saw engage in play were two young dogs at the biological field station where we lived and conducted our research during our stay in Nicaragua. These two dogs were approximately 8-10 months old, unrelated according to the staff there, and quite well fed. Their nutritional status was a result of a stream of biologists feeding them leftovers, much to the horror of the local people, many of whom have experienced times of hunger themselves and did not approve of or appreciate precious food resources being given so casually to dogs.

Traveling is always enlightening, and it is interesting to note how different members of society, no matter what the species, are perceived and treated across different cultures. It is essential to keep in mind the role that economics plays in the treatment of animals. Nicaragua is one of the poorest countries in the western hemisphere. The memory of the abuses suffered by the people at the hands of the few powerful members of the government before the 1979 revolution and the loss of thousands of lives and massive suffering that resulted from Hurricane Mitch (and the resulting floods and landslides from which the country has still not fully recovered) a short 10 years ago are still very fresh in the minds of many citizens. Getting enough to eat and basic survival are real concerns for a considerable proportion of the population. Nicaraguans, like other people everywhere, choose to feed their children first, and I hope nobody questions my great love of dogs when I say that, as a parent, I respect that. Only when poverty everywhere is adequately addressed by the worldwide community can the lives of individuals of all species be expected to improve.

--Karen London

Dog Communicates By Keyboard

I came home last night to find that my Standard Poodle Raja had gotten into the garbage. Because I know that he will sometimes do this, I have the garbage in a solid metal can with a sturdy lid, and I put a gallon jug of water on top of the lid to make sure that the lid stays on. Last night, he had knocked over the metal can. The lid came off, and I came home to a trail of shredded paper towels, cheese wrappers, vegetables, and other table-scrap leavings, scattered throughout the kitchen and living room floors.

At first I was angry and frustrated. I was only gone for about an hour, and it was still about two hours away from Raja’s normal evening feeding time. But then I started to think about why he might have done it. The day had been cold, and because it is now April, I have not been heating the house. Raja’s metabolism was probably crying out for food. And then I rushed out of the house without feeding him. Even though I was running a short errand, he had no way of knowing when I would get back.

After I thought this through, I wished that he could have communicated with me that he was hungry before I left for my errand. I would have cheerfully fed him his food, had I realized.  I just didn’t pick up on his hunger level. In the future, however, it might be possible for dogs to communicate such information to their humans in a high-tech sort of way.

An article by two Brazilian scientists in the April issue of the journal Animal Cognition points the way to the future for how dogs can communicate with people about such things as being hungry (Rossi, A. P. and C. Ades, 2008, A dog at the keyboard: using arbitrary signs to communicate requests, Animal Cognition 11: 329-338).  The authors taught a dog to use a keyboard to communicate requests for food, water, going for a walk, being petted, going to a crate, getting a toy, or going to pee.

The scientists taught a mongrel dog named Sofia to press different symbols on a keyboard as a way of making requests.  The symbols were very distinctive.  For example, an X stood for “pet me,” a triangle stood for “give me water,” a big circle stood for “give me food,” and a small circle stood for “put me in my crate.”  When Sofia pressed a symbol, a tape-recorded word was played in Portuguese corresponding to the meaning of the symbol.  The dog’s behavior prior to and after pressing the symbol was monitored on videotape, where the experimenters assessed the direction of Sofia’s gaze toward objects corresponding to the symbols, or movements that reflected her intentions.  Some 87 percent of the time Sofia’s gaze at an object or movement corresponded to the symbol that she pressed.

Use of symbols has been shown previously with chimps, but not with dogs. The chimp Sarah could arrange plastic symbols, and the chimp Lana could use a modified screen to formulate requests. The bonobo Kanzi can use a keyboard to communicate relatively complex information. But this is the first study that has shown that dogs have the ability to use symbols to communicate with humans.

Perhaps sometime in the near future, we all will have keyboards hooked up to our computers, and our dogs will press those keyboards, generating a computerized voice that will say something like, “Please take me outside to pee.”  Usually I am pretty adept at reading my dog’s body language. However, when I get rushed and busy, as happened last night, I can certainly use some help.

--Con Slobodchikoff

Puppies Know What Pointing Means

The other day I was playing ball with my Standard Poodle, Raja. Ball is one of his favorite games. The rules are simple. He brings me the ball and expects me to pry it out of his teeth and throw it down the length of the kitchen. If I am being uncooperative about extracting the ball from his mouth, he will eventually let go of the ball so that it falls into my hand, and will nudge my hand with his nose, letting me know that I am being remiss in my part of the game. Occasionally I try to fool him, and throw the ball not into the kitchen, but into the living room.  By the time I do this, he has already run along part of the length of the kitchen, expecting to catch the ball. He stops and looks around in all directions, trying to see where the ball went, a puzzled expression on his face. I then relent and point to where I threw the ball. As soon as I point, he runs in that direction and quickly finds it.

I never knew how and when he caught on to my pointing. Now a recent study in the journal Animal Behaviour shows that puppies as young as 6 weeks old understand what pointing means (J. Riedel, K. Schumann, J. Kaminski, J. Call, and M. Tomasello, 2008, The early ontogeny of human-dog communication, Animal Behaviour 75: 1003-1014). The study did several experiments with groups of puppies that were 6-, 8-, 16-, and 24-weeks-old.  One of the experiments involved having one person hold on to the dog while another person sat in front of the dog and pointed and looked at one of two inverted cups where food had previously been placed. The other cup was empty, and both cups had been smeared with food to try to eliminate odor cues.  All of the puppies, including the 6-week-old ones, correctly chose some 80 percent of the time the cup that had the food and had been pointed to by the experimenter.

In another experiment, a visual marker was used. As before, there were two cups, one empty and one containing food. The experimenter showed the dog a visual marker, a black and white piece of wood, and then placed the marker on the cup with the food and looked at the marker while the dog was released to choose a cup. All the puppies did extremely well, getting the correct cup at better than 80 percent of the time, and the 24-week-old puppies scoring 100 percent correct on this experiment.

Prior to these experiments, other experiments with adult dogs showed that the dogs were quite good at picking up on pointing cues. What was a surprise was that dogs as young as 6-weeks were also able to respond to pointing. It suggests that the process of domestication must have selected for traits that allowed humans and dogs to communicate from the time the dogs were very young. Interestingly, neither wolves nor apes are very good at picking up on pointing cues provided by humans.  Although from a genetic standpoint wolves and dogs are very closely related, studies such as this one suggest that we cannot look to wolf behavior to help explain the behavior of our dogs.

--Con Slobodchikoff

Dog Tricks For Visits To The Veterinarian

Many dogs do not exhibit their best behavior at the vet?s office, which makes visits there a lot less fun for everyone. Objections to receiving medical care can take the form of unruly behavior, signs of stress like salivating excessively or shaking, and even aggression. The worse your dog's behavior is, the harder it is for the vets and vet techs to examine and treat your dog, which makes the visits even longer, which can make your dog's behavior even worse.

One of the best ways to make visits to the vet better for everyone is to teach your dog to perform certain behaviors that he will need to do while at the office and in the examining room. Training your dog to do the things that he will need to do at the vet's can help avoid the stress of being physically manipulated. For example, teach your dog to step up onto a small platform when asked so that he can perform this same "trick" on the scale at the vet's. So many dogs get pushed and prodded up onto the scale with frustration and anxiety resulting in all parties, and this is largely unnecessary.

Another thing to teach a dog is to go "belly up" for abdominal exams. Many dogs get disoriented if placed in this position, and this discomfort can result in fear, anxiety, aggression, and an exam that is too harried to be useful. If you practice having your dog lie on his back with his legs spread out away from his body, it will become less alarming for your dog to assume this posture for an exam. Once your dog can do this on cue, get him used to being touched on his belly while in this position so that he will not be surprised when the vet touches him after he does this trick. As a biologist who is easily amused, I taught my dog to perform this trick to the cue, "Boy or girl"?

Many dogs react badly at the vet when their paw is grabbed, but this is something that commonly needs to be done in order to draw blood. Some dogs seem to dislike the feeling of a paw being held, others seem to feel off balance if the paw is taken while in a standing position, and still other dogs just don?t like to be touched without warning. Teaching your dog to "shake" in order to get them to present a paw greatly increases the likelihood that this procedure will go more smoothly. A dog who has been taught to shake will not be surprised by having their paw taken, will tend to sit before presenting their paw, and many get used to how it feels during the repetition that is so essential in training any new skill. For maximum effectiveness, work up to holding onto your dog's paw for a long time (up to a minute) when you practice this at home so that when your dog?s paw is held for longer than a moment at the vet's, it will not be the first time he experiences a longer shake than is typical.

I am willing to bet that all small animal veterinarians would be ecstatic if every dog could reliably perform a "down/stay." This would make vaccinations, exams, and anything else that requires the dog to remain still (which includes a lot of treatments!) easier, more effective, and faster. This is a great skill for so many practical purposes in life, and making vet visits better is at the top of the list.

Besides making visits to the vet less objectionable for everyone, training your dog to perform these behaviors on cue shortens the time it takes the vets and vet techs to do what they need to do. This efficiency will leave you more time to discuss any concerns you have about your dog with the veterinarian. Many people resist taking their dogs to the vet even when they know their dog needs medical care, simply because the experience is so dreadful for everyone. Dogs benefit greatly from regular visits to the vet as well as emergency ones, which is why training them specifically to handle this part of their life should be a fundamental part of all dogs' education.

---Karen London

Great Reads For Serious Dog Lovers

I get phone calls and e-mails all the time from people asking me how they can learn more about the field of canine behavior. My answers always include academic study, attending seminars, actually training dogs to a high level in some area for fun or competition, and reading everything possible on the subject. I find that people are most eager to pursue the reading avenue, possibly because it is easy to get access to books, and this is one inexpensive option that has the advantage of being doable in the comfort of home. Naturally, the next question is always what books are best. The general answer is to read widely from a variety of authors, but the specific books change as new books get published. Here are some of my favorite picks for great dog books to read.

If you want to know more about training in general, I have two favorites. Family Friendly Dog Training: A Six Week Program for You and Your Dog by Patricia B. McConnell and Aimee M. Moore is based on a six-week curriculum for beginning dog training classes, and covers the basics every dog should know and how to teach to teach them in a step-by-step way. Excel-erated Learning: Explaining in plain English how dogs learn and how best to teach them covers learning theory and how it applies to dog training.

If you want to learn more about the science of canine behavior, consider delving into The Domestic Dog: Its Evolution, Behaviour and Interactions with People, which is edited by James Serpell or The Behavioural Biology of Dogs which is edited by P. Jensen. Both of these books contain chapters on a range of topics from the world?s top scientists and their studies of all things canine. Steven Lindsay's three volume set entitled Handbook of Applied Dog Behavior and Training is perhaps the most comprehensive treatment of the subject to date.

If your desire is to learn about specific topics or areas of problem behavior, there are arrange of possibilities, depending on exactly which issues you need to know more about. Patricia McConnell has a series of booklets on a variety of topics. Some of her titles are The Cautious Canine: How to Help Dogs Conquer Their Fears, Feeling Outnumbered: How to Manage and Enjoy Your Multi-Dog Household, I?ll Be Home Soon: How to Prevent and Treat Separation Anxiety, and Feisty Fido: Help for the Leash Aggressive Dog.

Other great specialty books include Raising Puppies & Kids Together: A Guide for Parents by Pia Silvani and Lynn Eckhardt, Visiting the Dog Park?Having Fun, Staying Safe by Cheryl Smith, and Help! I'm Barking and I Can?t Be Quiet by Daniel Q. Estep and Suzanne Hetts.

For books that combine moving, educational stories with practical, useful information and scientific backup for everything in the books, there are several books to consider. Patricia McConnell's The Other End of the Leash: Why We Do What We Do Around Dogs explains the human side of behavior within the dog-human relationship. The Covenant of the Wild: Why Animals Chose Domestication examines the mutualistic relationship between humans and other animals, including dogs and debunks the old-fashioned idea that these relationships were good only for the humans and that the humans imposed it on animals. The Nobel Laureate Konrad Lorenz' Man Meets Dog is an amazing foray into the ideas and speculation of a great scientist as he contemplates his own dogs and their behavior.

For some great reads that are literary and enjoyable as well as informative, consider James Herriot?s Dog Stories, which is an insightful and delightful collection of adventures in the life of a country vet in Yorkshire England. His stories are probably the most charming animal tales that have ever been written. Caroline Knapp?s book Pack of Two: The Intricate Bond Between People and Dogs is about one woman?s quest for love and how she finally found the intimacy that had eluded her in all her previous relationships when she adopted a dog. Have tissues on hand. Dog is My Co-Pilot is a wonderful volume of essays by professional writers about every facet of sharing our lives with dogs.

Finally, a couple of classic reads are books that everybody serious about dog training behavior has read, or at least should read. The books Genetics and the Social Behavior and the Dog by John Paul Scott and John L. Fuller and The New Knowledge of Dog Behavior by Clarence Pfaffenberger both explain the classic studies and breeding programs that informed our current views on the heritability of behavioral traits in dogs, critical socialization periods, and the effects of emotional traits on performance.

Karen Pryor's book Don't Shoot the Dog: The New Art of Teaching and Training brought a whole new perspective on positive training methods to the entire dog training world, and wins my personal vote for the best book title ever.

If you are interested in reading dog books of any kind, there is a single website that is worth checking out. It is called Dogwise.com, but in my house we call it the hide-your-credit-card site because I love it so much and spend so much money there.

--Karen B. London

Rico, The Dog Who Understands Words

Wouldn’t it be nice to talk to our dogs and know that they understood every word we say? I talk to my dog all the time, and I have some limited proof that he understands some of what I am saying to him. When I say, “Where’s your ball?’ he goes and gets his ball, when I say “Do you want to go outside/” he runs to the front door, and when I say, “Are you hungry?” he wags his tail vigorously and runs around in circles. However, all of that doesn’t have to mean that he understands what I am saying. It could merely be operant conditioning at work. He might have learned to associate a particular set of sounds with a response that results in a reward.

Now we have Rico, a 9-year-old border collie (at the time) who was tested by rigorous experiments and found to understand the meanings of about 200 different words. In a report in the journal Science (J. Kaminski, J. Call, J. Fischer, 2004, Word learning in a domestic dog: Evidence for “fast mapping,” Science 304: 1682-1683), Rico was tested for his ability to retrieve objects that he had never seen before. The experimenters took some pains to make sure that there was no subtle cueing going on. In one experiment, Rico and his person waited in another room while the experimenters arranged at random some of the 200 objects whose names he knew, in groups of 10 objects per time. Then Rico was asked by his person to bring two of the objects, that neither he nor his person could see directly. Rico successfully brought 37 out of 40 objects that were requested. In another experiment, a novel item, that Rico had not seen before or knew the word for, was placed with 7 objects that Rico knew, and his person asked him to bring the novel object, saying the word for the object. Out of 10 such sessions, Rico was successful 7 times. Finally, four weeks after he was exposed to the words for the novel objects, he was asked to retrieve one of those objects from a group of 4 familiar objects, 4 objects that he had never seen before, and the novel object that he was asked to retrieve a month before. Rico brought back the correct object 3 out of 6 times, a rate that the experimenters say compares well with how humans remember the names of objects.

So it seems that Rico actually knows the words that stand for specific objects. As one commentator has pointed out (P. Bloom, 2004, Can a dog learn a word?, Science 304: 1605-1606), Rico knows only 200 words, while a 9-year-old child knows thousands of words. However, let’s just assume, for the sake of argument, that dogs have a language that they use to communicate with other dogs. Then we can ask: Just how many words of dog language do WE know?

--Con Slobodchikoff

In Defense Of Tug

Many people have worried that tug is not a game that we should play with our dogs, but that's a shame because so many dogs love it so much. It allows dogs to engage in behavior that is very natural to them and highly enjoyable as well.

Of course, for some dogs, tug may not be a good idea. For example, dogs who are prone to excessive arousal or aggression induced by high arousal are not good candidates for a game of tug. The same warning applies to dogs with poor bite inhibition and poor self-control as well as those who tend to creep up the toy with their mouths during a game of tug. Additionally, it may exacerbate object-guarding behavior in dogs who already have that particular issue. For most dogs, however, tug is a great activity.

There are so many benefits to playing this game. First of all, it is interactive and requires cooperation between humans and dogs to start and maintain the tugging. It can give dogs a lot of exercise, and even help them stretch their bodies prior to other activities such as running or agility. In terms of its benefits for agility dogs, tug can be a great way to rev a dog up prior to a competitive run for maximum success on the course.

Some really important benefits of tug that make most dogs more pleasant to be around are that it is a great way to teach them the commands "take it" and "drop it" and it teaches them better mouth control in general.

The popularity of allowing dogs to play tug has varied over time. For a long time, many people advised against playing tug out of concern that it creates or worsens aggressiveness in dogs. There were concerns about teaching dogs to use the full force of their mouths, teeth and jaws to try to pull something away from a person. Later, there was a move towards noticing the benefits of tug, but just making sure that the dog didn't "win" at tug. There was a time when tug was considered okay for most dogs as long as they were not allowed to keep the toy at the end. The concern was that the dog would feel that he had "won" and that this would have bad consequences for his view of his status relative to the human he had just triumphed over in the game. Otherwise, the cooperative aspects of tug were recognized as useful for the relationship between the dog and the human.

Recently, a research study by Rooney and Bradshaw has addressed this very issue and the researchers found that "winning" by keeping possession of a toy after a game of tug has no impact on the relative status of a human-dog pair. However, we should still be thoughtful about letting certain dogs keep the toy after tug. In the same study, these researchers found that the most playful dogs in the study exhibited significantly higher amounts of playful attention seeking behavior when they were allowed to win. So even though there is no problem from a status point of view in allowing a dog to "win" at games, it may be better not to allow it with those playful dogs who become relentlessly pushy about seeking more play time.

The general feeling in the field of dog training and behavior is that tug is a good game for dogs and people and that dogs can learn a lot from playing it. Now tug has become so popular that many trainers actually teach dogs how to play this game in puppy classes. The idea is that the earlier dogs can learn the beneficial lessons that tug has to offer such as impulse control, mouth control, and cooperation as well as "take it" and "drop it," the safer and more fun the game will be for all involved.

Consider a game of tug with your dog and have fun!

--Karen London

Dominance Rank Status And Learning

Recently, an interesting article was published by a Hungarian team of researchers about the relationship between dominance rank status and learning of dogs. In the article (Pongracz, P., V. Vida, P. Banhegyi, and A. Miklosi. 2008. How does dominance rank status affect individual and social learning performance in the dog (Canis familiaris)? Animal Cognition 11: 75-82), the researchers report on three experiments that they did with 91 dogs representing a variety of breeds.

For each experiment, the researchers set up a V-shaped barrier consisting of a frame and transparent wire mesh.  In the inside point of the V they placed some object that each dog liked to play with, and then observed how long it took the dog to go around the barrier and retrieve the object.  In their experiments, they used dogs that fell into three groups: dogs who were the solitary canine residents in a household; dogs who lived in multidog groups in a household and were rated as having dominant status by their owners and the experimenters; and dogs who lived in multidog groups and were rated as having subordinate status by their owners and the experimenters. No dog was tested in more than one experiment.  Each test dog performed the retrieval behavior three times within a single experiment.

In the first experiment, the researchers tested to see if there was any difference in the time that it took either the dominant status or subordinate status dogs to go around the barrier and retrieve their favorite object. They found that there was no difference – both dominant and subordinate dogs took about the same length of time to retrieve their object.

In the second experiment, they used an unfamiliar demonstration dog, who went around the barrier and retrieved the object while the test dog was watching.  After the demonstration dog retrieved the object, the test dog was allowed the retrieve the toy, which had been replaced in the inside of the V.  The researchers found that the solitary dogs took a little while to retrieve the object the first time, but then quickly retrieved the object the next two times. Also, the subordinate dogs quickly retrieved the object all three times. However, the dominant dogs took a long time all three times to retrieve the object.  The solitary dogs either learned on the second and third attempts from watching the demonstration dog, or figured out on their own how to solve the problem.

Apparently, the subordinate dogs learned how to retrieve the object by watching the demonstration dog, while the dominant dogs did not learn anything from watching the demonstration dog.

In the third experiment, an unfamiliar human walked along the barrier and retrieved the object, while each dog was watching. Here, the initial test with all three categories of dogs showed that the dogs took a considerable amount of time to retrieve the object. However, with successive demonstrations by the unfamiliar human, all three categories shortened the retrieval time.

The authors of the article suggest that these experiments show that dogs with subordinate status learn by watching the behavior of more dominant dogs. On the other hand, dogs with dominant status can get access to the resources that they need whenever they want to, so there is no necessity for observing the behavior of other dogs. The authors further suggest that humans are treated as having dominant status by all dogs, and for this reason even the dogs with dominant status improved their retrieval time when watching a human.

--Con Slobodchikoff