Four experiments investigated the ability of a border collie (Chaser) to acquire receptive language skills. Experiment 1 demonstrated that Chaser learned and retained, over a 3-year period of intensive training, the proper-noun names of 1022 objects. Experiment 2 presented random pair-wise combinations of three commands and three names, and demonstrated that she understood the separate meanings of proper-noun names and commands. Chaser understood that names refer to objects, independent of the behavior directed toward those objects. Experiment 3 demonstrated Chaser's ability to learn three common nouns--words that represent categories. Chaser demonstrated one-to-many (common noun) and many-to-one (multiple-name) name-object mappings. Experiment 4 demonstrated Chaser's ability to learn words by inferential reasoning by exclusion--inferring the name of an object based on its novelty among familiar objects that already had names. Together, these studies indicate that Chaser acquired referential understanding of nouns, an ability normally attributed to children, which included: (a) awareness that words may refer to objects, (b) awareness of verbal cues that map words upon the object referent, and (c) awareness that names may refer to unique objects or categories of objects, independent of the behaviors directed toward those objects.

John W Pilley

Alliston K Reid

Behavioural processes

BEHAVIORAL PROCESSES 致力于从任何理论角度发表关于动物行为的高质量原创研究。它欢迎从行为分析、认知、行为学、生态和进化的角度考虑动物行为的贡献。这份清单并非详尽无遗，特别欢迎整合跨学科理论和方法论的论文。

Behavioural Processes is dedicated to publishing high-quality original research on animal behavior from any theoretical perspective. Contributions are welcomed from the fields of behavioral analysis, cognition, ethology, ecology, and evolution. We particularly encourage papers that integrate interdisciplinary theories and methodologies.

《Behavioural Processes》致力于发表关于动物行为的高质量原创研究，欢迎从行为分析、认知、行为学、生态和进化等多个理论角度进行贡献。我们特别鼓励整合跨学科的理论和方法论的论文。

Category	Quartile
生物学	4
生物学, 动物学	3
生物学, 行为科学	4
生物学, 心理学生物	4

Border collie comprehends object names as verbal referents.

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