Betsy (born 2002) is a black and white longhaired

Border Collie The Border Collie is a British list of dog breeds, breed of herding dog of the collie type of medium size. It originates in the region of the Anglo-Scottish border, and descends from the traditional Sheep dog, sheepdogs once found all over the ...

, credited with being one of the world's most intelligent dogs.

Biography

Betsy lives in

Vienna Vienna ( ; ; ) is the capital city, capital, List of largest cities in Austria, most populous city, and one of Federal states of Austria, nine federal states of Austria. It is Austria's primate city, with just over two million inhabitants. ...

Austria Austria, formally the Republic of Austria, is a landlocked country in Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine Federal states of Austria, states, of which the capital Vienna is the List of largest cities in Aust ...

with her owner, who goes by the pseudonym "''Schäfer''" (). Betsy is also a pseudonym given to her by

animal cognition Animal cognition encompasses the mental capacities of non-human animals, including insect cognition. The study of animal conditioning and learning used in this field was developed from comparative psychology. It has also been strongly influ ...

researchers. At ten weeks of age, Betsy was able to sit on command and knew numerous objects, such as a ball and set of keys, by their name and would fetch them on verbal command. Betsy was discovered after her owner answered a request by ''

National Geographic Magazine ''National Geographic'' (formerly ''The National Geographic Magazine'', sometimes branded as ''Nat Geo'') is an American monthly magazine published by National Geographic Partners. The magazine was founded in 1888 as a scholarly journal, nine ...

'' to submit intelligent animals for study. Betsy was one of two dogs (both of which were Border Collies) whose intelligence was beyond that of

Rico The Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act is a United States federal law that provides for extended criminal penalties and a civil cause of action for acts performed as part of an ongoing criminal organization. RICO was ...

, also a Border Collie, who knows over 200 words. Betsy was featured on the cover of the March 2008 edition of ''National Geographic''.

Intelligence

Betsy has a

vocabulary A vocabulary (also known as a lexicon) is a set of words, typically the set in a language or the set known to an individual. The word ''vocabulary'' originated from the Latin , meaning "a word, name". It forms an essential component of languag ...

of more than 340 words, which rivals that of the

great ape The Hominidae (), whose members are known as the great apes or hominids (), are a taxonomic family of primates that includes eight extant species in four genera: '' Pongo'' (the Bornean, Sumatran and Tapanuli orangutan); '' Gorilla'' (the ...

s in terms of intelligence and

lateral thinking Lateral thinking is a manner of Problem solving, solving problems using an indirect and creativity, creative approach via reasoning that is not immediately obvious. Synonymous to thinking outside the box, it involves ideas that may not be obtai ...

. After hearing a word only twice, Betsy is able to decipher that the sound is a command or instruction and regards it as such. Betsy is believed to learn in the same way that human

toddlers A toddler is a child approximately 1 to 3 years old, though definitions vary. The toddler years are a time of great cognitive, emotional and social development. The word is derived from "toddle", which means to walk unsteadily, as children at thi ...

do, if not faster. Betsy is capable of interpreting the correlation between a two-dimensional photograph and the object it depicts, and is able to retrieve the item simply by seeing the image, despite never having seen the depicted object or the photograph before. During testing, Betsy retrieved the correct item 38 out of 40 times. Betsy knows 15 people by only their name. It is believed that Betsy's unusual intelligence can be attributed to dogs' prolonged association with humans,

evolution Evolution is the change in the heritable Phenotypic trait, characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. It occurs when evolutionary processes such as natural selection and genetic drift act on genetic variation, re ...

and her breed—the Border Collie was found to be the most intelligent breed of dog by psychology professor

Stanley Coren Stanley Coren (born 1942) is a psychology professor, neuropsychological researcher and writer on the intelligence, mental abilities and history of dogs. He works in research and instructs in psychology at the University of British Columbia in V ...

in his 1994 book ''

The Intelligence of Dogs ''The Intelligence of Dogs: A Guide to the Thoughts, Emotions, and Inner Lives of Our Canine Companions'' is a 1994 book on dog intelligence by Stanley Coren, a professor of canine psychology at the University of British Columbia. The book expla ...

''. Juliane Kaminski, a cognitive psychologist who tested Betsy, hypothesised that her abilities are the result of the use of the Border Collie breed as

working dog A working dog is a dog used to perform practical tasks, as opposed to pet or companion dogs. Definitions vary on what a working dog is, they are sometimes described as any dog trained for and employed in meaningful work; other times as any ...

s, their high motivation levels and that they historically had to pay close attention to their owners' commands when engaged in

herding Herding is the act of bringing individual animals together into a group (herd), maintaining the group, and moving the group from place to place—or any combination of those. Herding can refer either to the process of animals forming herds in ...

References

{{reflist 2002 animal births Animal intelligence Individual dogs Individual animals in Austria

Biography

Intelligence

See also

References