Why are cats harder to teach than dogs? Are cats less intelligent?
It is dangerous to get in the middle of a dog vs. cat discussion, but we will take the risk. Cats are not really less intelligent than dogs. Or, at least we don’t know this because it is so hard for them to fill in the little circles on the standardized test forms. The issue really isn’t whether dog or cats are easier to train, but the range and type of reinforcers cats and dogs are sensitive to. Dogs are highly social pack animals. Their behavior can be strongly reinforced by just a little attention from other members of their pack, especially the pack leader (you). Thus, there are many opportunities for a dog’s behavior to be shaped by incidental, attention-based reinforcement. This is one of the reasons dogs seem to take on many human characteristics. They are taught to be more human by attention we give to human like responses. It is also likely that they teach us to be more dog-like because we respond to their social attention. Cats are less generally social and less sensitive to
It is dangerous to get in the middle of a dog versus cat discussion, but we will take the risk. Cats are not really less intelligent than dogs. Or, at least we don’t know who is smarter because they can’t easily fill in the little circles on the standardized test forms. The issue really isn’t whether dog or cats are easier to train. The issue is the range and type of reinforcers cats and dogs are sensitive to. Dogs are highly social pack animals. Their behavior can be strongly reinforced by just a little attention from other members of their pack, especially the pack leader (you). Thus, there are many opportunities for a dog’s behavior to be shaped by incidental, attention-based reinforcement. This is one of the reasons dogs seem to take on many human characteristics. They are taught to be more human by attention we give to human-like responses. It is also likely that they teach us to be more dog-like because we respond to their social attention. Cats are less generally social and less
