How Smart Are Pomeranians

We all wonder how smart our dog is in comparison to other dogs. How smart are Pomeranians?

Pomeranians are one of the most intelligent dogs. Pomeranians are ranked as the 23rd most intelligent breed. Pomeranians have good memory capacity, adapt easily, learn quickly, problem-solve, and have quick natural instincts.

In this article, I discuss how smart Pomeranians are, how a dog’s intelligence is determined, and why a popular method for assessing a dog’s intelligence is so controversial.

Are Pomeranians Smart

Stanley Coren a psychology professor and neurobiological researcher famous for his research regarding canine behaviors and the human-canine bond developed a method for determining the intelligence level of dogs.

Stanley Coren even wrote the book on dogs’ intelligence, The Intelligence Of Dogs.

According to Stanley Coren, a dog’s intelligence is based on 51% of its genetics and 49% of its environment.

Stanley’s method defined three different aspects of intelligence to test and rank dog breeds.

The types of intelligence used were:

• Instinctive Intelligence
• Adaptive Intelligence
• Working and Obidence Intelligence

Stanley asked obedience judges registered with the AKC to test different breeds of dogs using the same testing method.

The overall results for a specific breed were only provided if he received over 100 entries for the breed.

Pomeranians finished as the 23rd most intelligent dog breed.

As a breed, Pomeranians were classified as “Excellent Working Dogs”.

Pomeranians understood new commands after only 5 to 15 repetitions.

Pomeranians also obey the first command given 85% of the time or better.

Is Stanley Cohens Method Of Determining A Dogs Intelligence The Best Method

Stanley Cohens’ method of determining a dog’s intelligence is very controversial for the following reasons.

• Stanley only evaluated working and obedience intelligence and situations
• Only dogs associated with obedience judges were tested (how many non-show dogs were in the test groups)
• Stanley himself never saw or interacted with the dogs
• The data was just accepted and not confirmed as accurate

This method was a good place to start but, dogs are intelligent in many different ways and should be evaluated on all levels.

How Do We Determine If A Dog Is Smart

Determining a dog’s intelligence can not be based on one variable alone.

With humans, our intelligence is based on reasoning, verbal ability, memory, numeric understanding, ability to learn from new experiences, ability to adapt, understanding and handling abstract concepts, and using knowledge to manipulate one’s environment.

A dog’s intelligence can be determined by very similar factors.

• Instinctive Intelligence
• Adaptive Intelligence
• Working and Obedience Intelligence
• Memory Capacity
• Awareness
• Perception
• Social Intelligence
• Problem-Solving Ability
• Emotional Intelligence

Are Pomeranians Instinctively Intelligent

The instinctive intelligence of a dog refers to the breed traits that have been inherited.

How well can a dog perform the tasks that the breed was bred for?

Pomeranians were originally bred as hard-working dogs pulling sleds, herding animals, and guarding.

At this point in time we are many years removed from Pomeranians being work dogs, today they are best known as companions.

Where Pomeranian’s instinctive intelligence shines today is when they are “on guard” protecting their owners from anything suspicious.

Are Pomeranians Loyal?

Do Pomeranians Adapt Easily

Adaptive intelligence refers to the ability of a dog to learn and adapt to its environment.

How fast can a dog adapt to its environment?

Have you ever noticed that your dog can learn where the dog treats are kept or your dog has learned to read non-verbal cues that you are about to leave?

Being able to learn what’s going on around them shows a sign of high intelligence.

As far as Pomeranians are concerned I’ve seen firsthand that they are able to learn and adapt quickly.

Both of our dogs know exactly where their food and treats are, they can even hear the container from the other end of the house.

Another example is how well my dog Murphy has developed a knowledge of nonverbal cues.

If I grab my daughter’s sparkly dance bag he immediately runs around with excitement knowing that he is about to go for a ride.

Murphy also likes to hang out in the bathroom with me when I take a shower, as soon as I grab a towel he runs towards the bathroom.

Do Pomeranians Have Good Personalities?

Do Pomeranians Have Working And Obedience Intelligence

Working and obedience intelligence is the ability of your dog to understand human language.

How many commands or words does your dog understand?

Most dogs are able to learn and understand 165 words, and extremely intelligent dogs can learn up to 250 words.

The smarter the dog is the faster it is able to learn and respond to words and commands.

A dog’s working and obedience intelligence also takes into consideration the speed that it takes for a dog to react to a command. Smart dogs respond faster.

Pomeranians are excellent at word knowledge and listening to commands.

Do Pomeranians Have Good Memory Capacity

A dog’s memory capacity is determined by more than just the ability to understand and remember words and commands.

Can your dog remember things?

A dog’s memory capacity is also determined by the ability to remember people, places, and objects that they have previously encountered.

Your dog might recognize a certain building and know that they are almost at the dog park.

Remembering extended family and friends when they come to visit.

You will also hear of the dog that gets lost away from home and somehow finds its way back.

It’s been debated whether dogs only have short-term memories. I think these examples prove that dogs have both short-term and long-term memories.

Pomeranians have very good memories and will often respond to people, places, and situations that they have experienced in the past.

Do Pomeranians Have Good Awareness

A dog’s awareness intelligence refers to its ability to observe and be aware of things in its surroundings.

Is your dog aware of what’s going on around them?

A good example of dog awareness is a dog knowing that a ball still exists when you’ve removed it from its view and hidden it.

Another example of awareness would be a dog recognizing other dogs regardless of their breed or size, along with recognizing other animal species that it may encounter.

Do Pomeranians Have Good Perception

A dog’s perception ability is a combination of how they use their senses to evaluate and perceive a particular situation.

How well does your dog use its senses?

Dogs are similar to humans and use the five senses smell, taste, hearing, sight, and touch to learn about our environment.

Pomeranians are extremely perceptive dogs, they are able to gather information quickly and respond to it accordingly.

Do Pomeranians Have Good Social Intelligence

Social intelligence doesn’t refer to how well your dog gets along with others but, to how well it learns from others.

How well is your dog able to learn by watching others?

Puppies are a great example of social intelligence. A puppy learns quickly by watching other adult dogs perform tasks.

These are not natural breed instincts but, rather things that need to be learned by reinforcement or observation.

The social rank of dogs also determines a dog’s performance in a social learning setting. Within a social group that has a clear hierarchy, the alpha or dominant dogs set the stage as being the influential demonstrators for learning.

The dominant or “alpha” dogs also tend to perform better when they observe a human’s body language or commands.

Pomeranians are independent and bold little dogs, they are very quick to observe and learn giving them a high level of social intelligence.

How Well Do Pomeranians Problem Solve

This is a fun and interesting form of intelligence to dig into.

How well does your dog solve problems?

The fun way to test this part of your dog’s intelligence is to play a game or hide treats in special dog puzzles to see how well your dog performs.

It is very interesting when we compare our domestic dogs to captively raised dingos in problem-solving.

Captive-raised dingos outperform our domestic dogs when it comes to solving non-social problems.

In a study where socialized wolves and domestic dogs were taught a simple task and then were confronted with a similar but unsolvable task, the domestic dogs looked towards the humans for help when the socialized wolves did not.

There are a variety of ways that you can look at that. Are domesticated dogs lazier when they requested help from humans? Did the wolves not realize the task was unsolvable and the domestic dog did? Have domestic dogs learned that they can ask for human assistance?

Are Pomeranians Emotionally Intelligent

The topic of emotional intelligence as it refers to dogs is a topic that is up for debate.

How accurately does your dog express emotions?

Studies have proven that dogs can express a magnitude of emotions including fear, disgust, excitement, joy, shyness, anger, contentment, affection, and love.

It is well-debated whether dogs feel guilt or not.

I’m sure you are familiar with the situations when your dog has done something it shouldn’t have and cowers with an expression of guilt.

It may seem obvious that dogs feel guilty.

Where it can be debated is some believe that the dog is not expressing guilt but, rather they are showing fear of being reprimanded.

It’s really hard to determine the difference.

Pomeranians in particular have proved to use a variety of emotions equivalent to a human toddler.

Are Pomeranians Emotional?

Are Pomeranians Dumb

You may have had those moments with your dog when you notice them chasing their tail in circles or eating something disgusting and wonder if your dog is dumb.

Pomeranians as a breed are not dumb. Every dog will have its own level of intelligence with strengths and weaknesses.

Just like people, we all have our moments.

Why Would You Hate Pomeranians?

How Can You Make Your Pomeranian More Smart

Just like people, a dog needs to practice and be challenged through education in order to gain more intelligence.

Here are some ways you can work with your dog.

• Expose your dog to different environments, people, and animals often
• Play with your dog
• Switch up your dog’s daily walk
• Keep working on obedience training
• Go to advance training lessons
• Challenge your dog with brain games
• Bring your dog to an agility course
• Teach your dog new tricks
• Teach your dog hand gestures

Final Thoughts

Pomeranians have been determined as the 23rd smartest dog breed.

This is quite an accomplishment for our little fluffy friends.

A dog’s intelligence is very complex and can be determined by evaluating nine major types of intelligence.

Some dogs exceed in some areas whereas others may be challenged.

The most important thing to remember is that every dog is different and unique. Celebrate your dog for exactly who they are and work together to improve the areas where they may need help.

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