Is your Dog a Genius?

Test Your Dog’s Memory

By Stanley Coren | Photographs by Keith Andrew Shore

You only go to the vet maybe once a year for those regular check-ups and booster shots, but, sure enough, whenever you get within five blocks of the vet's office, your dog starts whining, panting, and looking anxious. Does she really remember from year to year the exact route you drive to get there?

Most people are interested in how intelligent their dog is. While there are predictable differences based upon the dog's breed (for example, Border Collies are a lot smarter and more trainable than Bulldogs), there is a lot of variability within each breed. This means that some Border Collies might be rather slow-thinking, while some Bulldogs might be college material. There are some well-documented tests for the general mental abilities of dogs (such as the one described in my book, The Intelligence of Dogs), and all such tests include measures of a dog's memory.