+354 Its interesting that dogs and other animals can pick up certain words human say, such as walk or food while as we can't really distinguish between one bark and another. amirite?

by Anonymous 13 years ago

Well generally you gesture when you say the word ,especially when training them, so when you say it they know that the sound means something.

by Anonymous 13 years ago

They learn with repitition and putting 2 together. They don't actually understand those words. They know that when you say certain words And they do certain actions they'll receive a treat or something if you've trained them to do so.

by Anonymous 13 years ago

No I understand classical conditioning. But throught that same train of thought, shouldnt we be able to understand what that bark means when the dog wants to pee or something.

by Anonymous 13 years ago

That is true. I know when my dog has to go though he grunts and wimpers a bit, but thats the only way to tell with my dog

by Anonymous 13 years ago

Yeah thats what I mean. I know the general manerisms of my dog when she wants something but if somebody were to play me a bark of her when she wanted food compared to when she wanted attention, I probably wouldn't be able to tell the difference.

by Anonymous 13 years ago

I can understand a difference between my dog's barks by their tone. I can tell if he's distressed or if he's just barking for the hell of it. I think it's similar with how dogs understand humans.. they pick up on our tone. They differentiate us being angry from us praising them.

by Anonymous 13 years ago

Exactly. I read somewhere that the brains of animals are programmed to be able to pick on the tone of vocalizations and understand them easily, regardless of species. I don't remember where I read this...

by Anonymous 13 years ago

My dog is a hotdog cuz my landlord won't let me have pets... It sizzles when it wants be to eat it..

by Anonymous 13 years ago

My dog knows the word hotdog like everytime we say it, she freaks out and goes over too the fridge.

by Anonymous 13 years ago

A lot of people //can// distinguish a sound clip of a dog that wants outside barking from one made of a dog that wants their toy. Even a baby, to an extent. "Infants just 6 months old can match the sounds of an angry snarl and a friendly yap to photos of dogs displaying threatening and welcoming body language."

by Anonymous 13 years ago

You can distinguish between a growl, whimper, or a bark. That's the basics of the sounds a dog will make, im sure a dog couldn't distinguish between Sit or Bit, you can't get too specific, like when people speak another language to you you can comprehend what their intentions are, not the meaning, but if they are yelling at you, or astonished by you, stuff like that

by Anonymous 13 years ago

Barks sound very similar, whereas words can sound very different.

by Anonymous 13 years ago

Words only sound familiar to us because that's our native tongue. I'm sure to a dog, all words sound the same to them, much the same as all barks sounding the same to us.

by Anonymous 13 years ago