As everyone knows, dogs are individual personalities and possess awareness that allows them to be trained and taught. Dogs' attentive qualities used to learn different behaviors change over the span of their lives. Researchers watched 145 Boarder Collies from 6 months old to 14 years old. The first test preformed was dropping a child's toy from above and observing how the dog reacted to it and how long it had interest in it. This test showed that all age dogs reacted the same way, but the older dogs lost interest in the toy quicker. A second test: someone known to the dog entered the room and pretended to paint a wall. All the dogs watched the human for a longer duration than watching the child's toy. Scientists concluded that dogs find more interest in "social" interactions than "non-social" interactions. Also, the older dogs have a more relaxed feeling, which made them lose interest faster than the younger dogs.
In another test, researchers studied the selective attention of the dogs. This test was a multitasking activity. Each dog had to find a treat on the ground thrown by the trainer, followed by looking at the trainer in the eyes after he/she made a sound with a clicker. The time taken to find the food and to look up at the human were both measured, and the results showed the 3 to 6 year old dogs had the fastest reaction time for both actions. The younger dogs preformed poorly based off of lack of experience, while the middle age dogs were the fastest due to their high sensorimotor abilities (unlike the older dogs whose motor abilities have begun to fade). These results show similarities between humans and dogs. Humans also show a peak in motor abilities before they begin to deteriorate, just like dogs.
Another comparison between dogs and humans includes an adolescence, or puberty, stage that allows "immature" changes to occur, like inability to focus. This stage varies but usually occurs between ages 1 and 2 for dogs and between ages 13 and 18 for humans. Additionally, dogs can be used as models for human diseases such as ADHD and Alzheimer's. Scientists are currently researching these topics and will continue to learn and teach similarities between humans and dogs.
Nature of Science Themes:
- Science is collaborative
- Science is based on evidence
- Role of credibility
- Importance of repeatability
- Role of motivation and curiosity
Link: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/04/140401102245.htm
These studies have very interesting implications on the dog's behavior and how it relates to humans, especially concerning how dogs can be models for ADHD and Alzheimers. Since dogs and people are exposed to a lot of the same stress factors, and they receive medical treatments that may contribute to their long lifespan.This allows for cognitive impairment in dogs, just like mental health problems with humans.
ReplyDeleteBut dogs are also exceptional because they receive medical treatments that may contribute to their relatively long life in human families. This allows for the emergence of other pathologies such as cognitive impairment in old dogs, which is analogous to the same mental problem in humans. Studying dogs is important to do to understand the relationship between dogs and humans, as well as it's implications on humans.