title: Why do adult dogs (Canis familiaris) commit the A-not-B search error?
abstract: It has been recently reported that adult domestic dogs, like human infants, tend to commit perseverative search errors; that is, they select the previously rewarded empty location in Piagetian A-not-B search task because of the experimenter's ostensive communicative cues. There is, however, an ongoing debate over whether these findings reveal that dogs can use the human ostensive referential communication as a source of information or the phenomenon can be accounted for by "more simple" explanations like insufficient attention and learning based on local enhancement. In 2 experiments the authors systematically manipulated the type of human cueing (communicative or noncommunicative) adjacent to the A hiding place during both the A and B trials. Results highlight 3 important aspects of the dogs' A-not-B error: (a) search errors are influenced to a certain extent by dogs' motivation to retrieve the toy object; (b) human communicative and noncommunicative signals have different error-inducing effects; and (3) communicative signals presented at the A hiding place during the B trials but not during the A trials play a crucial role in inducing the A-not-B error and it can be induced even without demonstrating repeated hiding events at location A. These findings further confirm the notion that perseverative search error, at least partially, reflects a "ready-to-obey" attitude in the dog rather than insufficient attention and/or working memory.
authors: Department of Ethology, Eötvös University.
authors: Zsófia
authors: Z
authors: Sümegi
authors: Department of Ethology, Eötvös University.
authors: Anna
authors: A
authors: Kis
authors: Department of Ethology, Eötvös University.
authors: Ádám
authors: Á
authors: Miklósi
authors: Research Centre for Natural Sciences, Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience and Psychology, Hungarian Academy of Sciences.
authors: József
authors: J
authors: Topál
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001522:Behavior, Animal / Q000502:physiology*; D002755:Choice Behavior / Q000502:physiology*; D003142:Communication; D003463:Cues; D004285:Dogs / Q000502:physiology / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D008297:Male; D009042:Motivation / Q000502:physiology*; D057805:Pets / Q000523:psychology