These dogs can learn new words just by eavesdropping

Some gifted dogs can learn words for hundreds of objects and pick up new ones just by listening in to the conversations of human family members — abilities that put them on a par with infants at about 18 months old. Only a few animals, including bonobos (Pan paniscus) and an African grey parrot (Psittacus erithacus), have been observed to recognize objects through unique names. Learning words indirectly through watching human interactions is even harder because it requires following a person’s gaze and, to some extent, understanding their intentions.