Test Your Dog: Is Your Dog an Undiscovered Genius?. Rachel Federman

       Introduction

      By the time babies are one year old, the act of sitting is unlikely to be met with much fanfare. As guests we’re told to have a seat, in church to be seated, as stragglers at the movies to get down in front. Otherwise, we’d be reluctant to sit on command, even if someone was waving a giant piece of cheesecake in the air.

      Dogs can sit much earlier than we can, yet a dog that will sit on command – outside and in the company of other energetic dogs – is a wonder to be marvelled at. A well-trained dog is seen as a smart dog, and therein lies the essential difficulty of determining a dog’s IQ.

      And because the only use dogs have for a pencil is as a barely adequate chew toy, it’s hard for us to get a clear picture of what goes on inside their furry heads.

      It’s especially tricky to compare one dog to another because the differences between breeds are great. The difference between a mastiff and a Chihuahua, for example, may be greater than the difference between your dim-witted brother-in-law and Koko, the “talking” gorilla. Think of the surprise and disappointment of a family who hoped a golden retriever would serve as a watchdog, or the disaster of thinking a Bijon Frise would help on a hunt. Dogs, though they share many traits with their wild ancestors, have been bred by humans to act in particular ways and many now barely resemble each other, in personality or appearance.

      So a single test can’t fully assess the variance across different breeds, while taking into account early life and training. An obedient dog brought up in the Police Academy is not necessarily inherently smarter than a wild dog who grew up on a council estate.

      The question this test addresses then is not “Does my dog have the capacity to understand complex numbers?” but rather “Can my dog function effectively in our world?” Aeons ago, a lazy couch potato dog – perfect for life in an apartment today – would have been the weakest member of the pack, just as today’s brilliant physicist might have been a huge liability for hunter-gatherers in the Stone Age. For any species, an intelligence test is context dependent. Today’s standardized intelligence tests for humans are attacked for ignoring that fact.

      Intelligence in dogs can be categorized into four basic areas: communication skills, social behavior, perceptual/motor skills, and memory and association. The higher order functions of judgment and resilience also factor into our understanding of canine aptitude.

      In designing this test, I’ve relied on Robert J. Sternberg’s Triarchic Theory of (Human) Intelligence which has been broadly applied to studies of canine IQ. Following Sternberg, I define intelligence as one’s ability to achieve a desired goal in one’s environment. After all, a border collie that’s a genius on a Scottish farm has a thing or two to learn before he will impress the poodles in the cafes along the Champs-Elysées.

      This test is not a rigorous intelligence standard compiled by a group of scientists huddled around their panting subjects and a massive pile of treats. It’s merely a fun gauge for adoring dog owners to see how adaptable, understanding, and yes, intelligent their best friends really are.

      Like a modern day Lassie, will your dog dial 999 if you fall and can’t get up? Will he bark until help arrives? Will he lie down next to you? Or will he circle around his leash, hoping for a walk?