Researchers at the University of California San Diego have recently provided strong evidence that dogs can understand words through the use of soundboard buttons. A study showed that dogs can understand specific words, not just react to their owners’ cues or body language. Trained with soundboard buttons, dogs responded correctly to words like "play" and "outside," according to UC San Diego.
The investigation, led by Associate Professor Federico Rossano of UC San Diego’s Department of Cognitive Science, ran a gamut of tests. Rossano, whose work features in the Netflix documentary "Inside the Mind of a Dog," has begun to rigorously explore interspecies communication. The study details that dogs managed to correctly respond to words, independent of their source, whether spoken or button-generated. "This study addresses public skepticism about whether dogs truly understand what the buttons mean," Rossano said in a statement, as detailed by UC San Diego. "Our findings are important because they show that words matter to dogs, and that they respond to the words themselves, not just to associated cues."
With its two-fold experimental approach, the team visited 30 dogs and conducted tests in their homes, while also supervising 29 dog owners in remote, citizen science-initiated trials. The research strove for maximum transparency and replicability, with its methodology and hypotheses pre-registered online before data collection even commenced. This preemptive measure is intended squarely to boost accountability and guard against biases or selective reporting.
Rossano emphasized that this research is just the start of understanding dog communication. The findings lay the foundation for future studies on how dogs might use buttons to create more complex messages. By studying dogs in familiar settings, the research is more reliable.
