Human Perceptions of Canine Intelligence
Abstract
What makes Lassie a smart dog? People have strong intui-tions about dogs' intelligence, yet the content and organiza-tion of these intuitions remain unknown. Two studies ex-amined the structure of laypeople's concepts of dog intelli-gence, creating a conceptual map of what people represent as a “smart” or “dumb” dog. Study 1 elicited open-ended ideas about dog intelligence. We turned consistent themes into items in a 50-item survey. Study 2 asked participants to picture either a smart or dumb dog and rate that dog on the items derived from Study 1. Participants strongly agreed in their ratings of smart and dumb dogs, and we discovered a coherent dimensional structure underlying people's intui-tions. They represent smart dogs as socially skilled with a good temperament, and dumb dogs as bad at physical rea-soning and avoiding threats. These representations align well with findings from canine research and with dog train-ers' practical knowledge.