Find out if your doggy can tell time. The answer will shock you.

Do dogs even have a concept of time?

They certainly know how to wait, but do dogs understand time as such?

A peep inside the dog brain
Before we can address how dogs think of time — if, indeed they think of it at all — we need to take a quick trip into the font of perception itself, the dog brain. Specifically, let’s look at the pineal gland, a tiny, seemingly insignificant bit of tissue, about 1 millimeter in length. Part of the endocrine system, which is responsible for the production, distribution, and regulation of hormones, the pineal gland is, in part, responsible for how both dogs and humans natively perceive time.

The pineal gland produces a hormone called melatonin, which influences a dog’s awareness of time, primarily governing daily, seasonal, and even sexual activity. In a day-to-day context, melatonin determines a dog’s circadian rhythms, colloquially known as the “body clock.”

The production of melatonin is relative and responsive to how much light is available from Earth’s yellow sun. During autumn and winter, when there is less daylight, more melatonin is made and released. In the spring and summer, less is needed, so less is produced. Our point here is that a dog’s time is largely governed without the aid or need of philosophical reflection.

Time, habit, and dog behavior
Of course, energy expenditure also makes a difference to a dog’s daily life. Whether a dog understands or thinks about being fed or taking a walk, if these operations are performed regularly, they become not only habitual, but anticipated.

Across the board — whether it’s a brand of food, a favorite quilt, or a late-afternoon walk — dogs are literally creatures of habit.

Is it possible that dogs sense time with their noses? 
As for leaving the house, we know that separation anxiety in dogs is real and that destructive behaviors can follow as a consequence of leaving them alone, whether that’s for an extended period of time or leaving at all. Is it possible that our scent, whatever olfactory sensation our dogs associate with us, has a kind of half-life or rate of decay that informs their concept of time and its passage?

What use has a dog for time?

Until such time as the rigorous work of science gathers substantially more evidence, our attempts to understand if dogs even have an active concept of time in the way that we do amount to little more than educated guesswork and speculative approximation. It is said that “every dog has its day,” but what is a “day” to a dog but a series of habitual events?

So it turns out that dogs are motivated by their learned habits rather than the time. It may really seem that your pooch knows exactly what time it is throughout the day, doesn't it?

For more information on dogs and time, visit Dogster.