Dogs And Concepts Of Time

[Odin-Genie]

This is not about mealtimes but a memory question. My elkhound has a favourite toy. When he sleeps at night, the toy could be at any place, outside in the yard, in the living room, behind the TV!! When he gets up in the morning, he usually seems to know exactly where he had put the toy and gets it. If it is in a room that is locked, he scratches on the door so that we would open it and he could get his toy.

If this is not memory, how would you explain it?

[Aidan3]

If this is not memory, how would you explain it?

The argument was that dogs specifically don't have "episodic memory" which is a term psychologists use to describe memories of specific events (or "episodes" in their life).

[koalathebear]

Continuing on Diva's point, Elbie seems to definitely know when a minute is up when doing a sit stay/drop stay. It's for this reason that our club tell us not to release the dog after exactly on one minute but give it a bit of tiem after that.

[Odin-Genie]

If this is not memory, how would you explain it?

The argument was that dogs specifically don't have "episodic memory" which is a term psychologists use to describe memories of specific events (or "episodes" in their life).

I'm referring to episodic memory as well. To remember where a ball was last kept, a dog would need to remember where he played with it last, and thus remember the last time he played with it.

[Burkes]

I am a rotational shift worker so there is no routine to what i work. Therefore, my dogs and cats are all shiftworkers too.

They never have a time that they expect anything. If I go to bed at 7am when I get home, they go to bed. Vise versa if I go to bed at midnight. There is no dinner time and we can go for a walk at any time of day. Yep, sometimes out and about at 3am.

I also foster and so far have only had one foster dog who didn't cope without routine. I could take her for a huge walk, do training then go to bed and if it was daytime, she would escape. Even jumping my 6ft fence with her Elizabethan collar on and eyes full of stitches (entropian). Now she is in a new home she doesn't try to escape at all.

Do they have internal clocks......well they never let me know about them:)

[Aidan3]

If this is not memory, how would you explain it?

The argument was that dogs specifically don't have "episodic memory" which is a term psychologists use to describe memories of specific events (or "episodes" in their life).

I'm referring to episodic memory as well. To remember where a ball was last kept, a dog would need to remember where he played with it last, and thus remember the last time he played with it.

Possibly, but other forms of memory could also explain this so the hypothesis presented by William Roberts could be valid without episodic memory or the ability to "mentally time travel". Spatial memory, for e.g, could just as easily explain how dogs know where objects are without them needing to remember that they placed a toy (or found prey) at some point in time, only that they placed it at some point in space.

It's a very abstract concept and it's not how most of us experience our own thought, so I hope what I said made sense

[SpotTheDog]

My cats show more awareness of time of day than the dog does. The cats become extremely fidgety from 9pm onwards, though I estimate this is entirely to do with hunger, as if someone else has fed them earlier in the day they don't display the same edginess.

Something I find quite amusing is their response to the cue that is me closing the lid of my laptop. I usually have my laptop on the couch with me, as I speak to overseas friends and family using Skype every evening. When I'm done I close the lid, and usually switch off the TV and get ready for bed - hence if I close the lid on the laptop, cue six cats rousing from various positions in the living room and trotting off down the hall to their bedroom.

[Diva]

The argument was that dogs specifically don't have "episodic memory" which is a term psychologists use to describe memories of specific events

Possibly, but other forms of memory could also explain this so the hypothesis presented by William Roberts could be valid without episodic memory or the ability to "mentally time travel". Spatial memory, for e.g, could just as easily explain how dogs know where objects are without them needing to remember that they placed a toy (or found prey) at some point in time, only that they placed it at some point in space.

It's a very abstract concept and it's not how most of us experience our own thought, so I hope what I said made sense

Spatial memory makes a lot of sense to me in terms of what dogs do - I'd say mine have excellent spatial/topographical memory which greatly exceeds my own. I have tended to attribute some of it to scent, but maybe it is just that sort of memory is well developed in them, it's easy to see an evolutionary advantage. Interesting!

[sandgrubber]

My dogs have a strongly routinized schedule and they have a clear sense of meal time. If I'm an hour or two late for feeding, they spend a lot of time looking at me, sitting by the dogfood container or fridge, and otherwise giving hints. I think that's a circadian rhythm with digestive system. Sleep rhythms are more flexible, but seem to have a circadian component. However, the bio-rhythms work along with cues they get from people.

When I shared dog care with my mother . . . I'm an extreme early riser and she's not a morning person . . . the dogs readily shifted between my routine and my mother's routine. I think they would naturally rise a bit before dawn, but if early rising means dealing with a grumpy person, they seem happy enough to sleep for an additional couple hours . . . or four hours.

I sense that my dogs are highly attuned to my mental state. If I'm having trouble sleeping and, say, am ready to rise at 3:30 am instead of 5 am, they pick up on the mental state and jump all over me in the 'rise and shine' excitement ritual. I can't disguise my state of wakefulness by trying to act like I'm asleep. Perhaps they listen to breathing. Who knows, maybe they sense brain wave patterns. On the other hand, if I get up at 1 am to pee, they generally snore through the whole thing . . . I don't know if this is because they know that peeing doesn't mean getting up, or because they're so deeply asleep at 1 am that they don't pick up my cues. Maybe a bit of both.

Edited March 21, 2011 by sandgrubber