Is it possible for animals, specifically domesticated dogs, to be mentally retarded?
My mother works as a special ed teacher and I worked at her school as a teacher aide, so I know a little bit about the subject in humans.
But as a joke, the other day I inquired to my husband as to whether our dog could be retarded. And now I’m wondering if it’s true.
She was the abandoned runt of a litter, she has VERY short attention span which can go from being asleep to tearing apart a pillow in seconds. She sort of displays OCD in that when we take her out to do her business she always goes to the same spot, smells the same cars, does the same things. She’ll get a line on smelling something and we absolutely CAN’T tear her away from it.
She doesn’t socialize well with other dogs. She’s not mean, but she won’t even join in with them. She gets scared around dogs and prefers cats or people.
She’s also afraid of feathers and water bottles, which, I don’t have to tell you…is a little nutty.
But most important to me is that she’s six and a half years old, and she still acts like a puppy. She jumps straight up in the air, talks, runs like a madwoman, forgets her commands…
I love her to death and I wouldn’t trade her for anything…but is it possible that she’s retarded?
TV Nation or The Daily Show had a thing on pets on prozac - there was a dog that was obsessed with a log, couldn’t go up stairs because it was dragging this log around with it.
They gave it prozac, and boom, normal dog.
Perhaps she isn’t retarded, just psychologically weirded out.
jarbabyj - That’s the best thread title I’ve seen in a long time.
Doug might have the answer here, I work with differently abled people so my field of expertise is slightly different but if your dog seems to be able to do normal dog things and figure out life’s little problems it might be the case that your dog suffers from some form of mental illness or anxiety.
IANADABE (I am not a differently-abled beagle expert), but, for the most part, are there any characteristics we see in humans that don’t manifest in some way in other mammals? I don’t want to get accused of anthropomorphizing, but animals can get similar illnesses, have obvious genetic predispositions towards behaviors, conditions, etc., then there’d be every reason to believe that mental retardation is possible.
The biggest issue is that if the mental retardation is too severe or leads to certain behaviors, then that animal would be Darwin’d out of the group pretty quickly…
I had a cat with Turner’s Syndrome: XXY (As diagnosed by a cat-loving genetics PhD).
He never learned to look at the handle of the door to be let out. About half the time, he’d look at the hinge and when the door was opened, he’d have to go all the way around.
He also sat under the bird feeder, looking up, waiting for birds to come.
He never remembered that he didn’t like toddlers until he was in said toddler’s arms.
I miss him. He was the only cat I’ve ever met with a generous disposition.
Ap
Umm I thought that was Klinefelter’s Syndrome. sorry to nitpick. Turner’s Syndrome is a partial or complete lack of an X chromosome.
On to the OP. I’ve had cats that I thought were a bit slow. Maybe unable to learn something that all the others could learn such as where the food goes when I pour it into the bowl. This one cat keeps looking at me like “when am I gonna get fed?” I keep telling him to look in the bowl right in front of his face cause I just poured it in there! I had another cat that would keep picking fights though every cat and some of the mice could kick his ass. I’ve had basset hounds and huskies and while the basset hounds have been kinda dumb, not to the point where I’d think they were retarded. The female basset hound did develop phobias of weird things like the flag or anything other bowl than her normal food bowl. If we gave her food in any other bowl, she’d just stand there and bark at it until we changed it. Still that doesn’t seem to qualify as retarded, just quirky.
I think your beagle fits in the quirky category too.
As far as I can see, she’s acting like a beagle. They are very loveable but not the sharpest knives in the drawer. Beagles are often described as difficult to train due to their distractability. Also, they LIVE to smell things - its what they were bred for. She’ll be a puppy all her life unless you overfeed her. That really slowed down my aunt’s beagle. Everyone kept mistaking it for a bassett hound. You may be on to something with the OCD though. Hard to tell with this energetic, friendly breed.
I know a brain-damaged dog. He definitely acts in a brain-damaged way. (Don’t know how to say it without being offensive!) Maybe that doesn’t count, since the brain damage was from a severe injury…
I don’t see why a dog couldn’t be “developmentally disabled” the same way a person could be. We just may not notice because we are not expecting speech, math skills, etc. Maybe some dogs that are “hard to train” are really mentally retarded. Interesting question.
This seems like very typical beagle behaviour for the most part. I’ve had a couple, and can concur with the following:
move from fully asleep to wide awake and active, and back again, in what seems like seconds
obsessive about smelling EVERYTHING, and very determined once they’re one a particular scent. They are very difficult to teach to walk on a loose leash - 90% of the beagles I see out walking on a leash are straining at the absolute end of the leash, and the remaining 10% have typically been so overfed they can barely walk.
doesn’t socialize all the well with other dogs. This can vary, but generally this seems to be true. They seem to like people much better than most other dogs (although they can be quite friendly with selected dogs).
odd phobias. I had one that was absolutely terrified of ceiling fans.
puppy behaviour long past puppy age. As VarlosZ said, avoid overfeeding (which can be hard because they love to eat and act as if they’re constantly on the verge of starvation) they usually remain very active for nearly their entire lives.
breaknrun- oops! You don’t know how chagrined I am. You are correct. He indead might have had Klinefelter’s Syndrome, but not Turner’s.
I have a co-worker who is an ex-vet tech. She said some vet clinics do not use oxygen monitors during surgeries, such as spay and neuter. She only recommends going to clinics who devote one tech to monitor the oxygen levels and other vital signs.
Performing surgery under general anesthesia could well be a cause of brain damage. She thinks very little of such practices. I agree.
Ap
Wow, thanks for the info. I feel bad that I never even thought to ask about that. The mrs and I love the vet we have as he seems very thoughtful and kind to the patients. Hopefully they’d never need surgery again since they’ve been neutered. None of them seem the least bit brain damaged though one cat has this weird quirk of turning his head upside down to look at you when he notices you looking at him.