Mentor/s
Drs. Deirdre Yeater & Dawn Melzer
Participation Type
Poster
Abstract
Infants demonstrate object permanence understanding during violation of expectation tasks. These tasks consist of expected (e.g., ball stops at solid wall) and unexpected (e.g., ball rolls through solid wall) events. Infants look longer at the unexpected event as opposed to the expected event (Perez & Feigenson, 2021). Similarly, studies have shown that dogs present increased looking times during unexpected object permanence tasks (Pattison et al., 2010). In the current study, dogs participated in a violation of expectation task which investigated object permanence understanding. To conduct this study, dogs were positioned in front of a stage with a concealed opening in the back wall and a ramp. One wall was placed at the end of the ramp, and the other in the middle of the ramp. An occluder was placed in front of the ramp. A tennis ball was rolled down the ramp, behind the occluder. After the occluder was removed, the dog would see either the ball was stopped in front of the solid wall (expected event), or the ball would appear to have rolled through the solid wall (unexpected event). Results reveal that dogs looked longer at the unexpected events, which suggests that dogs have object permanence understanding.
College and Major available
Psychology BS
Location
Digital Commons & West Campus 2nd Floor University Commons
Start Day/Time
4-28-2023 12:00 PM
End Day/Time
4-28-2023 2:00 PM
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 4.0 License.
Prize Categories
Most Scholarly Impact or Potential, Most Creative
Can Dogs Detect a Surprising Event?
Digital Commons & West Campus 2nd Floor University Commons
Infants demonstrate object permanence understanding during violation of expectation tasks. These tasks consist of expected (e.g., ball stops at solid wall) and unexpected (e.g., ball rolls through solid wall) events. Infants look longer at the unexpected event as opposed to the expected event (Perez & Feigenson, 2021). Similarly, studies have shown that dogs present increased looking times during unexpected object permanence tasks (Pattison et al., 2010). In the current study, dogs participated in a violation of expectation task which investigated object permanence understanding. To conduct this study, dogs were positioned in front of a stage with a concealed opening in the back wall and a ramp. One wall was placed at the end of the ramp, and the other in the middle of the ramp. An occluder was placed in front of the ramp. A tennis ball was rolled down the ramp, behind the occluder. After the occluder was removed, the dog would see either the ball was stopped in front of the solid wall (expected event), or the ball would appear to have rolled through the solid wall (unexpected event). Results reveal that dogs looked longer at the unexpected events, which suggests that dogs have object permanence understanding.
Students' Information
Samantha Faeth (Senior Biology major & HONORS program) Graduates 2023
Emma Higley (Senior Psychology major) Graduates 2023
Nicole Alvira (Senior Psychology major) Graduates 2023
Kaitlyn Borg (Senior Psychology and Communications Disorder major) Graduates 2023
Marissa Colloca (Senior Psychology major) Graduates 2023
Gabrielle Esposito (Senior Psychology major) Graduates 2023