The recognition of canine pain behaviours, and potentially hazardous Catch-Neuter-Return practices by animal care professionals
The assessment of animal welfare is reliant upon the application of animal- and resource-based indicators. Animal-based indicators (physical, physiological and behavioural) are considered to be more representative of an animal’s welfare state but are more difficult for an assessor to interpret. In order to build a robust composite framework for the assessment of welfare of […]
Do dogs distinguish rational from irrational acts?
Range et al. (2007, Current Biology, 17, 868-872) found that dogs, Canis familiaris, copy others’ means to achieve a goal more often when those means are the rational solution to a problem than when they are irrational. In our first experiment, we added a further control condition and failed to replicate this result, suggesting that dogs […]
Ontogeny and phylogeny: both are essential to human-sensitive behaviour in the genus Canis
none
Search Behavior in Various Breeds of Adult Dogs (Canis familiaris): Object Permanence and Olfactory Cues
Human analog tests of object permanence were administered to various breeds of adult dogs (Canis familiaris). Experiment 1 showed that the performance of terriers, sporting, and working dogs did not differ. Dogs succeeded in solving invisible displacement problems, but performance was lower than in visible displacement tests. Familiarity with the task had some influence because […]
Attachment Behavior of Adult Dogs (Canis familiaris) Living at Rescue Centers- Forming New Bonds
In this study, 60 shelter dogs (Canis familiaris) were observed in the modified version of the Strange Situation Test, which has proved to be a useful method for studying dogs’ attachment behavior toward humans (J. Topal, A. Miklosi, V. Csanyi, & A. D6ka, 1998). Before testing, 40 dogs were handled 3 times for 10 min. […]
Comprehension of human communicative signs in pet dogs (Canis familiaris)
On the basis of a study by D. J. Povinelli, D. T. Bierschwale, and C. G. Cech (1999), the performance of family dogs (Canis familiaris) was examined in a 2-way food choice task in which 4 types of directional cues were given by the experimenter: pointing and gazing, head-nodding (“at target”), head turning above the […]
Dogs, Canis familiaris, communicate with humans to request but not to inform
Dogs are especially skilful at comprehending human communicative signals. This raises the question of whether they are also able to produce such signals flexibly, specifically, whether they helpfully produce indicative (‘showing’) behaviours to inform an ignorant human. In experiment 1, dogs indicated the location of an object more frequently when it was something they wanted […]
Breed differences in dogs’ (Canis familiaris) gaze to the human face
Domestic dogs (Canis familiaris) have been submitted to a vast process of artificial selection and to date, there are hundreds of breeds that differ in their physical and behavioral features. In addition, dogs possess important skills to communicate with humans. Previous evidence indicates that those abilities are related to the domestication process and are modulated […]
Do More Sociable Dogs Gaze Longer to the Human Face than Less Sociable Ones?
Domestic dogs (Canis familiaris) are especially skillful in communicating with humans, and they rely on special abilities to do that. One of these skills involves gazing at human faces in cases of uncertainty or when seeking for something out of reach. In this study, we evaluated the relationship between dogs’ sociability level and the ability […]
Cooperation and competition during dyadic play in domestic dogs, Canis familiaris
Social play involves a dynamic combination of competition and cooperation, yet few studies have systematically evaluated the cooperative side of play. We studied dyadicplay in domesticdogs to investigate factors influencing variation in cooperative play strategies like self-handicapping and role reversal. Dyadicplay bouts were videotaped and coded for asymmetric behaviours. We predicted that variation in play […]