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They definitely know the intonation of what we're saying.
"Do you want to go for WALKIES" always gets a better response than "Who shredded my paper? Did you do THIS?"
I saw that article, and thought, "Well of COURSE dogs can understand a lot of what we say!" There have been other studies (sorry, I don't remember the details), one of which concluded dogs can understand at a level similar to a 2-year old child.
And even without these studies, most dog owners already know this. I could write a long list of probably 50 sentences that my dog understands, such as:
Get your ball, get your bone, get your duck (and many other specific toys).
Time for bed (she'll get in her crate).
Let's go out.
Let's go home.
On the rug, wipe your feet.
Do you want a treat? (Oh boy does she know that!)
Do you want to go get the mail?
Do you want me to scratch your belly?
Many, many more sentences, plus a whole lot of one word commands.
My husband, son and I had this conversation the other day. My son said that our dogs can be trained to go put a paw on a dictionary when they hear the word "dictionary," but that they don't truly know what a dictionary IS. Agreed. But they do know what TREATS are, and WALKS, and OUTSIDE. Said in any tone, my dogs know what those words mean.
Ha!! My s/o mentioned this to me last night. Funny! We had/have three dogs, and we were fostering two others. I decided to adopt one of the fosters, and so since I told everyone, my mamma's boy has been ignoring me for the past two days. Last night he was lying at the opposite end of the couch and I said to my s/o, "I feel like I'm being shunned." Mamma's boy IMMEDIATELY got up and came to cuddle with me! LOL
Creepy little dude understands way too much of what I say!!
My two understand so much of what I say, I have to spell some words. I'm in trouble if they learn how to spell.
I'm most impressed with "its Abby's turn". When we play fetch, she hasn't got a chance with speedy Ozzie, so I tell him its Abby's turn and he begrudgingly lets her get the ball. They also have the patience of a saint when I say "wait a minute" for whatever it is they want.
Ugg forgot my point. They don't just Know words from habit like walk or treat, they understand what they mean. My kids make fun of me for thinking my furbabies are smart, but knowing what patience and taking turns mean, shows they learned at a younger age than my human kids did.
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