I was wandering about the intelligence of Rottweilers when I was considering the type of dog I was going to own, also their intelligence in respect to their training abilities, as I was looking for a guard dog to protect me and my family.
What I discovered in my quest to understand the intelligence of dogs was that it is just as difficult to determined as it was to try to understand the intelligence of humans, intelligence is a complicated thing to pin point or to nail down.
One thing that help to complicate matters was the variety of different breeds of dogs, which naturally meant that they would have a variety of different characteristics to go along with each breed of dogs, which is similar to that of each individual person.
However, despite the difficulties there is still a great deal to learn from investigating, for example, to figure out or to test the intelligence of dogs or humans for that matter, we would have to look at or try to measure their problem solving abilities.
Also their ability to learn by comparing it with something that is equal to the test subject, however the problem with that is as I mentioned above is individualism, because each test subject would have individual experiences as it relates to humans and dogs would have their traits.
So where do we go from here? Is the ability to learn quickly a sign of intelligence? If intelligence is to be judged by abilities, wouldn't it stand to reason that dogs who possess other abilities e.
g.
pointers and retrievers should be classed as having intelligence? While trying to understand this issue I have found that even dog trainers, dog experts and researchers have the same difficulty trying to understand this dilemma also, so we are not alone.
One major problem I see is that people are confusing the characteristics of a breed and the ability to be trained with the dog's desire to please their owners.
While failing to see that some dog's characteristics show that some dogs don't have the desire to please or the need for the ability to be trained, such a dog is the Siberian Husky who would prefer to explore and figure out things for themselves.
One thing that is vital to understanding this issue is that the abilities of dogs and their eagerness to please and learn are not the only way to measure intelligence, as can be seen being exhibited in sled dogs who possess a different type of intelligence.
Most dog's abilities can be trace back to their inherited pass, in that as I have mentioned in an earlier article, dogs are by nature pack animals, however domesticated they have become.
Their interaction in social situations has allowed them to understand their obligations within the pack and this can be called some level of intelligence.
Another issue that need to be looked at is the fact that some dogs have been selectively breed over hundreds of years in order to produce certain traits.
Despite all of this, what should be understood is that owners/trainers must exercise due patients, persistence, loving and caring of their dogs in order to extract the desired outcome of having a dog.
While understanding that their dogs capacity, abilities and desires are all inherited traits in all dogs, leading to the conclusion that all dogs are intelligent in their own way, it is their nature.