Last
winter in my psychology honors class, my now-mentor, Dr. Doris Davis, gave a
presentation on a study in which a Border collie was trained to identify 1,022
different toys by name; fortunately for me, Dr. Davis was looking for a student
to replicate this study with her two newly obtained Great Pyrenees puppies, and
I jumped at the chance to work on a project so fetching. For those
unfamiliar with this breed, Great Pyrenees are huge, fuzzy, polar bear-esque
canines, with stubborn temperaments likely stemming from historical
autonomy. In other words, as opposed to Border collies and other
so-called “herding” dogs that are known for their apt communication abilities
with humans (e.g., a farmer’s dog who can herd sheep back to the barn on
the farmer’s command), Great Pyrenees still remain a breed who typically
operate as guard dogs for the farm animals, independently of their owners.
My
research is concentrating on what is referred to as the Domestication
Hypothesis, which loosely states that the ability of dogs, like the
aforementioned Border collie, to exhibit some features of human language, is
the product of social communicative exposure with humans. Bluntly
speaking, however, this summer I have had the wonderfully fun task of spoiling
my mentor’s two puppies, Marina and Sugar, rotten. I regularly bring them
new toys and train them to identify such with specific proper nouns through
repetitive exercises and play, in turn I reward them with treats and tons of
affection. Some of Marina and Sugar’s favorite toys include Spaceship,
a little, red, squeaky rocket ship and Trunks, a plush, squeaky
elephant.
I
have learned that there’s a definite quota of difficulty
involved in animal behavioral research, but I love a challenge and I’m really
thankful for the opportunity to independently problem-solve through
them. I particularly have had a ruff time navigating the
puppies’ natural insubordination and aversion to hot weather. One example
I can think of is how when I first tried to begin their experimental
training, I realized that Marina and Sugar didn't know how to fetch! My
study revolves around the dogs using retrieval as a method of identification,
and even though I had spent the months prior teaching them simple
behavioral commands like sit and roll over, it never even
dawned on me that they didn’t know how to play with toys! They wouldn’t
even touch the toys I showed them, never mind fetch them; but after a good
week of training focused solely on touching, going to, and later fetching
objects, I could finally restart the study.
As
we are now reaching the tail end of the summer, my research is far from
done! I will continue to work with Marina and Sugar throughout the fall,
and use this project for my honors thesis culminating next spring. But I
already have ideas for future experimentation with the pups to expand on this
particular subject area of human-dog social cognition in Great Pyrenees.
Paws down, my experience with URSP has been a blast!
