Some clever dogs can eavesdrop to learn new words

Embargoed until: Publicly released: 2026-01-09 06:00

International

Photo by Jamie Street on Unsplash. Story by Rachel McDonald, Australian Science Media Centre

Some dogs that are particularly good at learning words can learn them by eavesdropping on human conversation, according to international researchers who say this would put their skills at the same level as 18-23 month old children. The researchers recruited 10 dogs that had already proven themselves to be gifted at learning the names of objects, and made them watch as their primary owner and another family member spoke in simple words about a new toy. As a group, the researchers say the dogs were then able to retrieve the correct new toy when asked at a rate well above chance. They say this requires complex social learning abilities that would take a child at least 18 months to develop.

News release

From: AAAS

“Gifted word learner” dogs can pick up new words by overhearing their owners’ talk

A group of “gifted word learner” dogs can learn new words that label objects by overhearing their owners talking with each other, according to a new study by Shany Dror and colleagues. These dogs can map a new word to a new object even when the word and object are not presented simultaneously.

Together, these abilities put these special dogs at the same word-learning level as 18 to 23-month-old children, Dror et al. conclude. Their findings suggest that humans are not the only animals that can learn new labels by overhearing third-party interactions.

The researchers tested this effect in dogs dubbed “gifted word learners” that had previously shown unusually good ability to acquire new word labels under natural conditions, without intentional training.

The gifted dogs were able to learn new words/labels passively, by listening in on conversations.

Journal/
conference: Science

Research:Paper

Organisation/s: University of Veterinary Medicine, Austria

Funder: This work was supported by National Brain Research Program NAP 3.0 of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (NAP2022- I-3/2022). Á.M. received funding from MTA-ELTE Comparative Ethology Research Group (MTA01 031). During the course of this study, S.D. and C.F. were supported by the Hungarian Ethology Foundation (METAL). S.D. was supported by the Austrian Science Fund (FWF PAT7848823 and W1262-B29, https://www.fwf.ac.at/).

Media Contact/s

Contact details are only visible to registered journalists.