I have worked with several dogs that developed light and shadow chasing behaviors after someone had them chase laser pointer dots. These dogs not only then continually chase the smallest flickers of light and shadows but also develop an anxiety disorder.
How could this be the result? Dogs never develop an abnormality after chasing actual objects, such as a ball, bird, or blowing leaf.
Here is what I believe is happening.
Let’s start with a natural activation of prey drive. A dog is chasing a rabbit. That is an actual physical object. The running rodent is the stimulus which activates the dog’s prey drive, causing the chase, capture, and consummation of the drive by killing (immobilizing) the rabbit. The same happens when a dog chases a ball or plays tug. The perception of the stimulus-object, the running rabbit, pertains to an actual event in the real world.
Now, let’s say a dog is chasing a fast-moving laser dot projected onto the floor or walls. The intensity of the laser dot is a hyper stimulus, creating a level of arousal and emotion that is considerably and abnormally greater than a manipulable object, but missing the important aspect of having a corresponding physical mass that can be touched and manipulated. Memories and associations are usually made when an experience creates arousal, targeting attention, a perception, and an emotional reaction. All those elements are present at a much higher level than the dog’s brain is capable of processing, to a degree that the physical object isn’t required for an response. Thus, an intense, memorable visual image is created in the mind of the dog without an attachment to a physical external object. That results in a type of hallucination because a forceful, abnormal connection forms between neural connections while in a highly aroused, emotional state. It is well known that hallucinations result in anxiety and mood disorders. Thus, you get a dog that hallucinates in some settings, chasing something that doesn’t exist, all the while experiencing varying intensities of anxiety. Furthermore, they then tend to either chase flashing lights or shadows. Lights for obvious reasons. Shadows because the afterimage of the laser light was also encoded into memory.
This is like a person who loses a limb to an accident yet feels pain in the missing arm. Or if you have seen the video where a person sits at a table. One arm is put behind a blind, and a fake arm and hand is placed in front of them that looks like their real arm and hand. Someone takes a hammer and hits the fake rubber hand, and the person is startled, cries out, and can feel pain. Or the police officer who thinks they have been shot, crying out in pain, but when the bulletproof vest and other clothes are removed, they find no injuries.
If you recall, they were doing some weird torture things to the prisoners in Guantanamo to evoke similar effects, setting them up to believe other prisoners were being beaten in nearby jail cells, or that they were being physically maimed while being roughed up, but it was all illusory.
The brain can do weird things.
I think an abnormal association is made in the brain of a susceptible dog when you have them chase a laser pointer dot. The light and shadow chasing and anxiety are a result of not being able to consummate the normal functioning of the prey drive. A hardwired connection was made. It is also important to understand that once something is learned, it is never forgotten. Thus, the remedy must address the underlying neural mechanisms that have been improperly connected physically and the psychological effects that are ongoing and perpetuating the reinforcement of the chasing.
Did I mention that I saw a dog chasing his tail obsessively? This is a similar phenomenon which requires a similar remedy.
Don’t play laser pointer with a dog.