imitative behavior in dogs?

Cleo has taught RC that fence fighting with the dog next door leads to being brought inside. LOL. Probably not what you were looking for tho. *laffs*

RC learned to freestack just like above but without a clicker...just treats and praise while watching her dam. That's how I do lead breaking as well, I hook the pup to Ellie and they do what she does...walk forward...instead of bucking like a bronco and throwing a huge loud fit.

Actually most pack hounds are coupled to another hound as part of their training...it's called "coupling" and they learn how to find the game, and run the game, and pack up etc, from the older more experienced hound, and I have some dim memory of Pointing dogs also being coupled with an older more experienced gundog to show them the ropes, so might check with some hunting people if you know any.

Cher's down is a result of watching Bevo during his obedience sessions.  I don't use a clicker with Bev unless I'm teaching him something new, so it was accomplished with a few treats, & lots of "good job"s.  She's learned wait, find heel, & bed by watching the other dogs.  She also understands the concept of "sit pretty" but she isn't co-ordinated enough to actually sit pretty without falling into a heap.

 I was purposely using a clicker in the attempt to make it extremely clear to her what behavior it was that I was reinforcing for him. I tried his easy button out last night, and spinning in a circle. She was too tired to circle around, and he is apparently snarky about other dogs touching "his" easy button. She investigated it a bit, but she didn't get a chance to touch it with enough force to activate it without him running her off.

 Definitely! Ena learned to back up by watching Emma (I'd laid the groundwork, but hadn't backed her yet). Jewel has learned heel, sit, and kennel VERY quickly, after watching the others do it, and get treats.

rwbeagles

I have some dim memory of Pointing dogs also being coupled with an older more experienced gundog to show them the ropes

Using an experienced pointer to train a young dog to honor is fairly common.  It's a really pretty sight. :) 

When Kivi was a puppy he learnt this neat trick that was used on him by an older dog. The older dog would spin around and present his butt to Kivi every time Kivi tried to bite or jump on him. Kivi only spent a minute with this dog, but he learnt the butt slam and immediately put it into practice with Penny. Penny found herself presented with a fluffy butt every time she tried to snap at Kivi's front end. She didn't know what to do about it.

I know of a Lab that learnt to press a milk top with his paw by watching another dog do it.

I did a lit review on observational learning some years ago. At the time, there was evidence of observational learning only in pigs, elephants, chimps and ravens. The mental heavyweights. ;) I've also heard anecdotes of octopus learning from watching each other. I would say cats can also do it. There was a spooky paper on Keas, the meat-eating parrots from New Zealand, bullying other Keas into making this contraption work that had been built to deliver food if two Keas worked together. And Pinon Jays are way ahead of everyone, figuring out who is worth fighting with and who they should submit to without a fight by watching who beats who in other arguments that don't involve them.

Absolutely, and right here in my own house!  Sequoyah learned to flip the latch on the baby gate to my office by watching me do it, and I had no idea she was picking up that knowledge until she did it.  One day, I came in here, and then I saw and heard her manipulate the latch, and was confronted by an Aussie in my lap.  So, I waited for her to do it again, and associated a cue with it.  Now, when I have stuff in my hands I just ask her to "open the door" and she does.  Flips the latch and either pushes or pulls the door open, depending on which side she is on.  Problem solving little workin' dog;-)))  So far, she hasn't figured out how to get it open when the latch is locked, which is a good thing, since it's designed to keep my less than continent 20 year old Yorkie out of the carpeted area.

For your reading pleasure:

http://www.nc.univie.ac.at/fileadmin/user_upload/dep_VNK_biologie/Kognition/Range_Selective_Imitation.pdf

I have 2 pics that come to mind of neiko imitating dakota when he was a puppy. Its really obvious.

neiko learned to shake just by watching dakota. (Just as on example)

I do not believe that dogs can imitate to the extent of some other species, but I think there is definitely some capability. A lot of literature on clicker training mentions dogs learning through imitation, especially literature on clicker training dogs to behave in shelter environments. I think it's an interesting concept, though I can't say I've ever noticed my personal dogs learning through imitation.

Some capability? Um, I'd say WAY more than some. That's how we train sled dogs. I don't train a darn thing into the pups, just place them next to a savy adult and they learn work ethic, how to behave, and what the proper response is to a command! It's the easiest thing in the world :0)

My best anecdotal example is that Nikon learned NOT to go in the basement from Coke.  Coke was trained not to go in the basement b/c he used to follow us down to pester the cats and raid the litter box.  I've never trained Nikon, he has just never gone down the stairs save for a few times I took him up and down to practice stairs as a puppy (slippery wooden stairs with open backs = good practice for a puppy).  I leave the door open when I go down and even though all the cats, cat food, and cat littler is sitting in plain view, he does not go down.

Also, in SchH when we do ragwork with really young puppies, if you get one that is a little timid or won't bark, usually doing a "puppy circle" gets them worked up and barking.  Basically you work 3-4 puppies at a time, just taking turns tossing the burlap rag at one while the others are barking at it.  The less interested, mute puppy usually becomes interested and starts barking. 

I've even seen our TD take a 6 month old dog that would not bark and work her alongside another 6 month old that did bark.  Now she barks just fine. 

Similarly, my Kenya never barked until we adopted Coke and after a few months, he started alert barks when people come to the door.  Now Kenya does the most barking of all the dogs, despite months of being mute even with me doing everything I could think of to motivate barking.

griffinej5

 Just wondering, if anyone knows of any documented cases of imitative behavior in dogs? In lieu of, or in addition to documented cases, anecdotes would be interesting as well.

HI 

There was a paper done out of I think Sydney Uni using M/R training (Model /Rival training ) that i guess is imitative in nature. It was suggested that it was more efficient than some other reinforcement techniques. I was not convinced of the result but was interested enough to read "The ALex Studies" which has some interesting chapters in it on the M/R technique. One day....

 http://www.vetsci.usyd.edu.au/research/animal_behaviour/index.shtml#projects

I couldn't help but notice the similarity between this photo of dogs play fightling and mine. Sorry about the OT :))

In general, this is known as Social Learning, pioneered by Albert Bandura's research into modeling and observational learning in humans. Good start, but I think he only scratched the tip of a very large iceberg. A great addition to Operant Conditioning and Classical Conditioning!

Social Learning is being studied quite heavily these days, especially in dogs as they seem to excell in this area.

A google search of "social learning dogs" should lead you to some great research. Just be careful to weed through the bias and read a lot of different sites and studies for a cross-section of what's going on.