Do dogs remember old places?

Dogs can remember what their owners have been up to, say researchers probing the nature of canine memory. The authors note that the rapid drop-off in success rates over time, together with evidence that the command was unexpected, shows that the dogs were recalling events that had not been imbued with importance – suggesting that they were relying on a type of episodic memory. This study shows that they can use a type of memory that allows them to recall and remember events that were not known to be important. Traditionally episodic memory has been linked to self-awareness but as we do not know whether dogs are self-aware we call it episodic-like memory. But, she added, it was not clear whether dogs are capable of remembering events with the same level of detail and context that humans do. When I think of my last holiday dinner, there’s a richness to that where I remember where I was, and when, and who I was with and so on. It’s not yet clear from the current study if dogs have that richness, but the paper is a nice step to starting to test these important questions.