Imitation and emulation by dogs using a bidirectional control procedure

A successful procedure for studying imitative behavior in non-humans is the bidirectional control procedure in which observers are exposed to a demonstrator that responds by moving a manipulandum in one of two different directions (e.g., left vs. right). Imitative learning is demonstrated when observers make the response in the direction that they observed it being made. This procedure controls for socially mediated effects (the mere presence of a demonstrator), stimulus enhancement (attention drawn to a manipulandum by its movement), and if an appropriate control is included, emulation (learning how the environment works). Recent research with dogs has found that dogs may not demonstrate imitative learning when the demonstrator is human. In the present research, we found that when odors were controlled for, dogs imitated the direction of a screen-push demonstrated by another dog more than in a control condition in which they observed the screen move independently while another dog was present. Furthermore, we found that dogs would match the direction of screen-push demonstrated by a human and they were equally likely to match the direction in which the screen moved independently while a human was present.