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02/02/2026 | Press release | Distributed by Public on 02/02/2026 11:07

Can Dogs Talk? NOVA Spotlights UC San Diego Research

Published Date

February 02, 2026

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Research led by UC San Diego cognitive scientist Federico Rossano is featured in an episode of NOVA, the long-running PBS science series known for bringing rigorous scientific research to a national audience. The episode, titled "Can Dogs Talk?," explores how scientists investigate whether dogs can meaningfully communicate using soundboard buttons-and what that behavior may reveal about language and cognition.

The documentary draws on years of UC San Diego-based research examining how dogs use the buttons-each programmed with a recorded word-to make requests and communicate with their human companions. While videos of "talking dogs" have circulated widely on social media, Rossano and colleagues approached the phenomenon with a different aim: to apply careful scientific methods to ask what dogs' button use might reveal about language, meaning and cognition.

"What interested us wasn't whether dogs are speaking like humans," said Rossano, director of the Comparative Cognition Lab and associate professor of cognitive science in the UC San Diego School of Social Sciences. "It was what these tools can reveal about dogs' minds, and how their behavior might help scientists better understand symbolic communication and its limits."

The work combines controlled experiments with one of the largest citizen-science efforts ever conducted on animal communication, drawing on data contributed by thousands of dog owners in everyday home settings. Studies led by the UC San Diego team have shown that dogs trained with soundboards can appropriately respond to specific wordsand, in some cases, use consistent two-word combinations in nonrandom ways-without implying that dogs possess human language.

Beyond dogs, the research contributes to broader scientific debates about how language-like communication emerges and which aspects of cognition may be shared across species. The work has received sustained national and international attention and was also recently featured by the University of California Office of the Presidentin its year-end highlights reel.

"Can Dogs Talk?" premieres on PBSon Wednesday, Feb. 4, 2026, at 9 p.m. ET/PT, and will also be available for streaming online.

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