Infopet

13/04/2024

Research report on risks of neutering for different breeds:

Spaying female and castrating male dogs, hereinafter referred to as neutering, is a US convention for the first year in the dog's life. Research on 35 breeds of dogs revealed that early neutering increases risks of joint disorders, such as hip dysplasia (HD), elbow dysplasia (ED), or cranial cruciat...

20/10/2023

Useful article on medical causes for behavioural problems in dogs and cats:

24/04/2023

New Family Dog Project study: Based on the brain size data of 159 breeds, we found that dogs have consistently smaller relative brain sizes than wolves supporting the domestication effect, but breeds that are more distantly related to wolves have relatively larger brains than breeds that are more closely related to wolves. Neither functional category, skull shape, longevity, nor litter size was associated with relative brain size, which implies that selection for performing specific tasks, morphology, and life history does not necessarily influence brain size evolution in domesticated species.

Original paper:
László Zsolt Garamszegi, Enikő Kubinyi, Kálmán Czeibert, Gergely Nagy, Tibor Csörgő, Niclas Kolm, Evolution of relative brain size in dogs – no effects of selection for breed function, litter size or longevity, Evolution, 2023;, qpad063, https://doi.org/10.1093/evolut/qpad063

12/01/2023

Interesting study, though as the authors note near the end, training can also affect how dogs perform:

The extraordinary genetic and behavioural diversity of dog breeds provides a unique opportunity for investigating the heritability of cognitive traits, such as problem-solving ability, social cognition, inhibitory control, and memory. Previous studies have mainly investigated cognitive differences b...

20/10/2022

''Taken together, our findings indicate that breed alone is not a reliable predictor of individual behavioural tendencies, including those related to aggression, and therefore breed-specific legislation is unlikely to be an effective instrument for reducing risk.''

Aggressive behaviour by dogs is a considerable social problem, but the ability to predict which individuals may have increased aggressive tendencies is very limited, restricting the development of ef...

19/10/2022

Who'd have guessed!

Dogs are highly sensitive to human behavior, and they evaluate us using both their direct experiences and from a third-party perspective. Dogs pay attention to various aspects of our actions and make judgments about, for example, social vs. selfish acts. However, it is unclear if dogs judge human co...

02/10/2022

This helps to understand what they mean by 'authoritative' https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parenting_styles #:~:text=Authoritative%20parents%20will%20set%20clear,consistent%2C%20not%20arbitrary%20or%20violent.

dogs with authoritative owners (high expectations, high responsiveness) had the highest rate of secure attachment, were highly social, sensitive to social context and were more persistent and successful on the problem-solving task than dogs with authoritarian owners (high expectations and low responsiveness) and permissive owners (low expectations, low responsiveness).
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10071-022-01694-6

25/05/2022

Anyone who has kept hamsters will know they can be quite nasty to one another. Even so, food for thought, and a message that the why of behaviour is often not as simple as it first appears: https://www.iflscience.com/plants-and-animals/crispr-editing-accidentally-turns-hamsters-into-angry-bullies/

Using CRISPR-Cas9 technology, scientists have managed to alter the social behavior of hamsters and make them far more aggressive, surprising the study auth

10/05/2022

Useful study from the UK: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-022-10341-6

A life table is a tabulated expression of life expectancy and mortality-related information at specified ages in a given population. This study utilised VetCompass data to develop life tables for the UK companion dog population and broken down by s*x, Kennel Club breed group, and common breeds. Amon...

06/05/2022

'Village dogs' vs pet dogs: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0168159122000983

Over the past two centuries, the typical life of dogs has changed dramatically, especially in the Global North. Dogs have moved into human homes, beco…

14/03/2022

Cats seem to have less interest than dogs in understanding human body language, and humans tend to make less effort to train them. Even so: https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2022.03.12.484069v1

A wide range of non-human animal species have been shown to be able to respond to human referential signals, such as pointing gestures. The aim of the present study was to replicate previous findings showing cats to be sensitive to human pointing cues (Miklósi et al. 2005). In our study, we present...

25/02/2022

Some of us already know this, though, as with humans, there is a bunch of 'it depends': https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-022-05669-y

Behavioural reactions towards a dead conspecific have been observed rarely in wild canids and there is no documented scientific evidence of grief in pet dogs. A quantitative analysis of grief-related responses in both dogs and owners was conducted, using the validated online Mourning Dog Questionnai...

22/01/2022

There is not enough evidence here to warrant changing feeding practices, eg we don't know about what the dogs ate, how much, or 'treats' ... but it's interesting: https://europepmc.org/article/ppr/ppr418863

21/10/2021

https://veterinarypartner.vin.com/default.aspx?pid=19239&id=8871225&

VetPartner Featured Article

29/09/2021

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-021-97002-2

Previous studies have shown that vocalizations of dogs can provide information to human companions. While acoustic signals of dogs have been intensively studied during the last decade, barking during hunting activities remains unstudied. The experiences of hunters indicate that owners can recognize....

28/07/2021

Well, yes ... https://phys.org/news/2021-07-cats-petted-hostility-affection.html

Experts in feline behavior and welfare at Nottingham Trent University also found that paying close attention to cats' behavior and body language and thinking about where to stroke them were key when improving interactions between cats and people.

05/07/2021

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2589004221007318

It is increasingly assumed that domestication has equipped dogs with unique socio-cognitive skills, which raises the possibility of intriguing paralle…

18/05/2021

https://phys.org/news/2021-05-long-term-stress-dogs-linked-owner-dog.html

Researchers at Linköping University have investigated whether the stress levels of dogs are affected by the people they live with. Stress levels for the past several months can be determined in both dogs and humans by measuring the levels of stress hormone stored in hairs as they grow.

04/05/2021

Abstract. Research on the genetics of domestication most often focuses on the protein-coding exons. However, exons cover only a minor part (1–2%) of the canine

21/03/2021

It's not just dogs who can learn how to solve problems by observing humans: https://www.wellbeingintlstudiesrepository.org/soccog/5/

Domestication drives changes in animal cognition and behaviour. In particular, the capacity of dogs to socially learn from humans is considered a key outcome of how domestication shaped the canid brain. However, systematic evidence for social learning from humans in other domestic species is lacking...

12/03/2021

https://arstechnica.com/science/2019/11/these-rats-learned-to-drive-tiny-cars-for-science/

It was for a study on how enriched environments can affect stress response.

26/09/2020

It's not easy to train a cat, but certainly possible: https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/09/kitty-see-kitty-do-cat-imitates-human-first-scientific-demonstration-behavior?utm_campaign=news_weekly_2020-09-25&et_rid=715507498&et_cid=3498745

Ability may be widespread in animal kingdom

21/08/2020

The sheep featured here are 'almost pets' ...

Shona and her daughters, Lorna and Aileen. Sheep as Leaders Posted on August 21, 2020August 21, 2020 by Alison Lever Sheep are able to take decisions independently of humans The word ‘sheep’ is often used to mean people who unthinkingly do what others in their group do, and who obediently follow...

12/07/2020

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/25/science/arctic-sled-dogs-genetics.html?unlocked_article_code=AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACEIPuonUktbfq4hkTlUZBibOVtkqqBaLwvHVy6A9jTrlKCWZDDpFwP9QDIWG9lvMbrElZ8c2237TYu59B4IVZa44yP5DbQsqQhO0o5CAldNefn1u8YjjBSZqgpuVGO1goGOvPze1IqJyz-Lh5k3baTHqD6zPwDZ2clYe1JhmdFiq3nAPz6_XQKUiipQlg6BXVt0tTiwAZSKIo_DtFx19Xd2CZRnW4QIyMPpLDXCRxZXPruJdL3gBTA7OX3h94m8j6d1DO99xPKn3Lx8oe8WWkqyiAqsNkwOK0Plo-16bJYrJ&

Fossils and modern DNA show the ancient roots of Arctic sled dogs.

11/01/2020

BBC Two

Well, yes, but it's not that simple!

Did you know that dogs bow at each other before they begin playing?! 🐶😯

08/12/2019

Harvard researcher finds canine brains vary based on breed

https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2019/09/harvard-researcher-finds-canine-brains-vary-based-on-breed/

Erin Hecht, who joined the faculty in January, has published her first paper on our canine comrades in the Journal of Neuroscience, finding that different breeds have different brain organizations owing to human cultivation of specific traits.

06/12/2019

Behavioural risks in female dogs with minimal lifetime exposure to gonadal hormones

New research on the impact of spaying. Not a simple issue. https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0223709

06/12/2019

Puppies Raised in a Home are Better Prepared for Life as a Pet

You could say that this research shows that dogs raised in the home are better adapted to life indoors!

The environment in which puppies are raised makes a difference to their behaviour.

24/10/2019

Teaching Rats To Drive Tiny Cars Helps Them Relax, Scientists Discover

https://www.iflscience.com/brain/teaching-rats-to-drive-tiny-cars-helps-them-relax-scientists-discover-/

A bunch of rats have learned how to drive tiny vehicles around to pick up food. How did this unlikely scenario come around, you're no doubt asking? Well, f

13/09/2019

Scientists Taught Rats to Play Hide-and-Seek, and They're Actually Pretty Good at It

Rats like to have fun: https://gizmodo.com/scientists-taught-rats-to-play-hide-and-seek-and-theyr-1838069088

New research suggests rats are capable of learning to play hide-and-go-seek with humans—and they appeared to legitimately enjoy the game. Rats, as this new research demonstrates, just wanna have fun.