ABSTRACTS FOR THE 2017 MEETING Home Schedule 2017 meeting |
ABSTRACTS
FOR THE 2017 MEETING Updated – 2 7 17 |
Do the math: behavior evaluations flunk Janis Bradley, Amy Marder Shelters use batteries of
provocative stimuli referred to as behavior evaluations for various purposes.
One purpose is as screening tools to predict, in dogs deemed possible
candidates for adoption (i.e., those not screened out at intake) whether they
will later exhibit dangerous behaviors in a home. However, there is wide
agreement that such tests have not been validated or uniformly administered
and there are ongoing attempts to develop better instruments. This
presentation will illustrate how existing data and principles of diagnostic
test evaluation demonstrate that reliably predicting problematic behaviors in
future adoptive homes is vanishingly unlikely, even in theory, much less
under the logistical constraints of real world shelters. In other words, when
a shelter dog tests positive for dangerous behavior on one of these formal
tests, it is much more likely that the test has failed the dog, rather than
the dog having failed the test. Among numerous barriers to validating a
behavior evaluation is the relatively low level of incidence of the behaviors
of interest in the general population of shelter dogs, making the occurrence
of many false positives inevitable. As a result, formal behavior evaluations
of dogs in shelters are unlikely to ever be better than or even as good as
tossing a coin in predicting whether dogs will express threatening or biting
behavior once adopted. This raises the question of whether it is humane or
prudent with regard to public safety to use these tests to make adoptability
decisions. The predictably unreliable results can create an unjustified sense
of security and can have life and death consequences for the dogs. It is time
to consider low tech, low cost, readily available alternatives that may be
more likely to reveal the true personalities of dogs and make them better
candidates for adoption in the process. |
Assessing and addressing pet owner obstacles to
companion animal care: Parvovirus prevention in Milwaukee Jenna Buley As with many companion
animal behavioral problems, changing dog owner behaviors is often the
greatest obstacle to addressing dog veterinary issues. In Milwaukee, rates of
parvovirus are much higher than other areas of the state and country. This is
an easily preventable disease from a medical standpoint and as such, its
continued occurrence is likely due to human/owner variables. With data
gathered from a Milwaukee, inner-city veterinary clinic and an inner-city
charter school with extensive bilingual resources, we will attempt to
quantify barriers to obtaining basic preventative care for pet dogs. This
will include data related to geography, income, transportation, language
& cultural barriers between pet-owners and animal care professionals, and
community and cultural knowledge of a specific disease (parvovirus) and its
prevention. We then hope to analyze these data to promote the dispersion of
knowledge and to improve access to vaccination. This model is important in
that it addresses a significant disease and can model how to identify and
change human variables to better improve other aspects of the complex
relationships that we have with domestic and companion animals. |
Assessment of a
Sleepover Program on the Cortisol Levels of Shelter Dogs Erica
N. Feuerbacher, Lisa M. Gunter One
of the greatest stressors for dogs living in animal shelters is social isolation.
Many studies have demonstrated that human interaction reduces cortisol in
shelter dogs and incorporating longer periods of interaction yields even
greater effects. These interventions are contingent upon removing the dog
from the kennel with cortisol reductions often lost when the dog returns to
the kennel. Increasingly, shelters are utilizing short-term fostering to give
dogs a break from the shelter. However, such programs have not been assessed
to determine whether they have the intended effect on stress. We assessed the
Best Friends Animal Society’s sleepover program in which shelter dogs go home
with a volunteer for an evening. We measured the creatinine:cortisol
levels from three urine collections: 1) the morning prior to the sleepover,
2) the morning after the sleepover and before the dog returned to the shelter
and 3) the morning after the dog returned the shelter. We found that the
urinary cortisol levels dropped significantly while on the sleepover, but
returned to baseline levels within a day of returning to the shelter. Our
data suggests that such programs are useful for reducing short-term stress
levels and opens many questions for these programs including what the
long-term effects of such programs are and how to enhance them. |
It’s a dog’s life:
Investigating behavioral, cognitive, and memory differences between owned and
shelter dogs Lisa
M. Gunter & Clive D. L. Wynne Previous
research has found significantly elevated levels of cortisol in dogs living
in shelters compared to dogs living in homes. However few studies have
examined possible behavioral and cognitive differences between these two
groups of dogs. We compared dogs living in an animal shelter and owned dogs
on a series of behavioral persistence, affective bias, memory, and reversal
tasks. In Study 1, we trained dogs to touch their nose to an experimenter’s
hand for a food reinforcer, and their persistence
was measured when food was no longer delivered. We found dogs living in homes
persisted longer in this resistance-to-extinction task than shelter dogs. In
Study 2, dogs were tested in a spatial location affective bias task to infer
differences in their underlying state as measured by latency to approach
ambiguous and unbaited probe locations. We found
shelter dogs perceived the near negative probe location more pessimistically
than owned dogs. In Study 3, we tested dogs’ short-term memory at varying
intervals of time on a novel task: a treat was placed behind a box with an
identical distractor nearby, and the number of errors was recorded. We found
that while owned dogs were more often correct than shelter dogs at all intervals, the difference was not significant. Finally,
dogs’ sensitivity to reinforcement contingency was tested in a reversal
learning task. Dogs were presented two identical boxes, one baited, and the
other not. After a dog reached a criterion level of success in selecting the
baited box, the baiting of the boxes was reversed. Reversals continued for 30
trials, and number of correct choices was recorded. Preliminary results from
this and the previous studies will be presented and discussed. |
Relational Aggression Suzanne
La Croix Relational
aggression is behavior which harms others through purposeful manipulation and
damage of their peer relationships (Crick and Grotpeter,
1995). This is currently a hot topic in elementary school circles, especially
as applied to aggressive and manipulative behaviors among young girls. It
umbrellas social exclusion, friendship withdrawal threats, giving the silent
treatment, and spreading malicious secrets, lies or gossip. Relational
aggression and its proximate biological bases are of interest to Applied
Animal Behaviorists because they provide a new perspective for examining
social (mis)behavior in adolescent dogs and offer a
construct for describing differential aggressive behavior between male and
female adolescent dogs. |
The over-under on urine
marking in dogs Anneke Lisberg, Tina Harasha While
many mammals use countermarking (scent marking in response to a conspecific
mark) and over-marking (marking over a conspecific mark) as communicative
signals, the function of mark placement as a possible signal component is
largely untested. In dogs, high-status and high tail-postured male dogs
countermark and overmark at higher rates than
low-status and low-tailed males, and overmarking
appears to follow different sexual and social patterns of use than
adjacent-marking (in dogs, urine-marking a few feet away from the original
mark.) But does “overmark” placement affect the
signal? If so, in what way? Overmarks could a) hide
the previous signal, b) blend with the previous signal, c) create a “bulletin
board” in which each mark is considered similarly but distinctly, or d) be
given preferential or more significant attention than the previous signal.
Using a habituation model previously used to test the effects of overmarking in rodents, we tested dogs’ responses to overmarks to differentiate between these four hypotheses.
We will share the new results of this ongoing study. |
When will I trust my dog
again? Re-establishing trust as part of behavior modification Jessica
Lockhart & Amanda Florsheim Working
with clients who are dealing with aggressive dogs can be a delicate balance between
treating the behavior issue in the dog and counseling the owner’s lack of
confidence. The clients are dedicated to their animals and are committed to
making things work; however, they all sing the same refrain, “When will I
trust my dog again?” The emotional betrayal that people feel when an
otherwise “normal” dog suddenly acts out is on par with being betrayed by a
loved one or close personal friend. Owners seem at a loss for how to deal
with an emotional slight from a non-human companion. This discussion group
will focus on ways to help clients regain lost trust and re-forge a
relationship with their companion animal. We will pay particular attention to
situations involving new children in the home and circumstances where the
owners are almost too stressed/worried to work with
their dogs. |
The science of animal
happiness Frank
McMillan Happiness
(referred to in the scientific literature as subjective well-being) has been
an elusive concept to study in humans. However, in the past few decades the research
has determined many of the causes and influences of one’s experience of
happiness. Short-term, or momentary, happiness refers to the feelings of the
moment, and its existence in mammals is not seriously disputed. However, the
form of happiness that makes up the primary focus in human psychological
research is that which exists as a long-term, life-as-a-whole experience.
Happiness has an enduring effect that transcends and outlasts the pleasures
and pains of day to day living. It is a pervasive sense over time that all is
well, a consideration of life overall. Happiness in humans has been found to
consist of an affective and cognitive component – the evidence for an
affective component stable over time and comparable to human long-term
happiness now exists in non-human primates. The key question is whether
animals have the capacity for the cognitive, or evaluative, component. Recent
empirical research on inequity aversion as well as
anecdotal observations suggest that they do. Moreover, recent research
has demonstrated that subjective well-being in animals is, as has been
well-established in humans, strongly correlated with personality. This
presentation will discuss the scientific evidence for the existence of a
long-term happiness state in animals, and why it matters. |
ARF’s Shy Dog
Socialization Program Barbara
Pezzanite The
Animal Rescue Fund of the Hamptons rescues dogs from across the United States
as well as from Puerto Rico. In some cases, such as dogs rescued from puppy
mills and the streets of Puerto Rico, the dogs have been inadequately
socialized with people, novel situations, and novel objects, rendering them
unadoptable upon arrival at ARF. Typically, however, these dogs are highly
social with other dogs. ARF’s Shy Dog Socialization Program was designed to
socialize these dogs with unfamiliar people and objects en masse. With the
help of a highly social dog, taking advantage of aspects of social learning
theory, and the use a small amount of training, more of ARF’s “shy” dogs can
be socialized at once, helping them progress faster to suitability for
adoption. |
The Effects of
Temperament on Stress and Upper Respiratory Disease in Dogs in Animal
Shelters Sasha
Protopopova & Kelsea
Brown Individual
variability is evident in behavior and physiology of human and non-human
animals. The influence of temperament on immune function and the endocrine
response in dogs has not received much attention. An inquiry into the
relationship of these systems is not only interesting from a basic science perspective,
but, more crucially, may influence the management of dogs housed at animal
shelters. While normally associated with mild disease and low mortality
rates, respiratory disease nevertheless poses significant challenges to the
management of dogs in the highly stressful environment of animal shelters.
Therefore, the aim of the study is to characterize the relationship between
temperament, the HPA axis, immune function, and occurrence and progression of
upper respiratory disease in dogs at animal shelters. In a correlational
study, close to one hundred dogs were assessed throughout their 2-week stay
at a city animal shelter. The dogs were subjected to a temperament test,
continuous in-kennel behavioral observations, and the collection of
physiological stress and immune function markers (urinary and fecal cortisol
and salivary IgA). The occurrence and progression of upper respiratory
disease was monitored through repeated clinical exams (rectal temperature,
body condition score, and occurrence of nasal and ocular discharge).
Understanding the role of temperament in immune responses to disease, disease
progression, and sickness behavior may improve shelter management practices,
and in turn, result in improved live-release outcomes. |
Are Underweight Dogs More
Likely To Guard Food in an Animal Shelter? Kat
Miller & Pam Reid Common
animal shelter “lore” suggests that dogs who are
underweight or were previously starved are more likely than normal weight dogs
to display resource guarding behavior, warning or aggressing towards a human
that approaches while the dog is eating. As a result of our anti-cruelty work
with law enforcement agencies, each year the American Society for the
Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA) receives hundreds of dogs that are
underweight or emaciated, as well as normal and overweight dogs. These dogs
come from large scale cases of dog fighting, hoarding, substandard puppy
breeders, and defunct animal “sanctuaries”, as well as individual cases of
cruelty and neglect. We administer standardized forensic medical and
behavioral examinations soon after intake for all animals seized by law
enforcement officers. We analyzed this dataset to examine the relationship
between body condition score (BCS) and food and chew guarding behavior as
expressed in a shelter behavior evaluation. The goals of this study were to: 1) Describe the prevalence and severity of
food guarding among canine victims of cruelty or neglect when assessed in a
shelter setting, 2) Examine whether prevalence of food
guarding varies by dogs’ cruelty case type, 3) Describe the range of body condition
scores found in this population, 4) Analyze the relationship between case
type, body condition score, and food guarding behavior, 5) Examine the odds that an underweight dog
will be a food guarder compared to normal or overweight dogs. We
had previously collected, analyzed and presented data from a sample of 469
dogs, with ambiguous results concerning the effect of cruelty case type. We
therefore collected data from an additional 431 dogs and will now present our
revised results from a sample of 900 dogs. |
Case(s) Study: Equal
Dogs/interdog Aggression (Or, Where I was confused
and failed to help) Melissa
Shyan-Norwalt The
goal of the present discussion is to share a few cases where I had no idea
what to do, and to generate a group discussion about how similar cases were
handled by others. There have been a few instances in my behavior consulting
where I felt totally confused. These cases involved interdog
aggression within a home environment: two dogs fighting in apparent
dominance-related activities. (I have been successful with interdog/home aggression under other circumstances:
possessive aggression, fear aggression, reactive aggression.) But the few
cases I’ve had where the dogs appear to be equal in status, show dominance
postures, and fight upon sight just stymie me. (Yes, I know about the operant
conditioning elements in these circumstances.) I will present two cases, what
I tried and what happened. Then I hope we will generate a discussion of what
techniques others have used, what we used to be told to use (deference,
selecting the “top dog,” et cet.) and what works. I know that “dominance”
terms are not popular now, and I do not have many of these cases. But they
completely flabbergast me and I’m not embarrassed to say so. |
The Human Component of
Behavior Consultations Beth
L. Strickler, Ellen Mahurin,
& Ayelet Berger The
essential components of pet behavior consultations include gathering
information from the client, engaging the client in the development and
implementation of the treatment plan, and ensuring that the client is making
progress through the patient’s treatment. Many clients are apprehensive when
entering into behavioral treatment for their pet as the unknown can be
discomforting. Training of individuals involved in behavioral therapy for
pets often concentrates on the interaction with and comfort of the pet while
ignoring the human-human interactions. An open discussion of techniques
utilized from first contact through resolution of the behavior problem(s)
will be discussed by our team. Topics and techniques to be discussed include
but are not limited to: Identifying
and affirming the client’s emotional state throughout consultation and
treatment, reading body language and replying, environmental relaxation
tools, and goal setting with reward systems for clients. |
Attitudes Toward and
Perceptions of Canine Problem Behaviors Kelsea Brown, Sasha Protopopova,
Janis Bradely Up to 15% of adopted dogs are subsequently returned. Owner
dissatisfaction with their dog’s behavior has been linked to a high risk of
both initial surrender and return of adopted dogs. However, only a small proportion
of people who subsequently adopted the same dog reported the same behavioral
issue, and only half of the problem behaviors indicated by the relinquishing
owner were observed by the new adoptive owners, indicating that perception of
the behavior as a problem, and not the presence of the behavior per se, may
contribute to relinquishment. These effects were particularly evident in Marder, Shabelansky, Patronek, Dowling-Guyer, and D’Arpino (2013), who found that the presence of
food-guarding in a new home was not correlated with owner perception of this
behavior as problematic. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to identify
and compare dog trainers’ and the lay public’s attitudes toward potentially
problematic canine behavior in large and small dogs. In a web-based
experimental mixed-design, 251 professional dog trainers and 495 non-trainers
(N=746) were randomly assigned to view videos of either small or large dogs
behaving in various ways. The participants’ perception towards the behavior
clips and the attitudes towards the dogs were assessed using quantitative and
qualitative measures. Results showed effects of both dog size and profession
on perception of behavior as problematic. The findings highlight the
importance of perception of behavior when considering education, behavior
consulting, and relinquishment interventions. |
Social Facilitation as a Tool for Treating Extreme
Fear in Undersocialized Dogs Kristen Collins & Pia Silvani ABS certified behaviorists
on the ASPCA®’s Anti-Cruelty Behavior Team have the unique opportunity to
work with animals seized from abusive situations. One of the more common
populations we deal with is fearful, undersocialized
dogs. The case study we’ll showcase describes the treatment protocols we
implemented to address extreme fearfulness in an adult male Australian
Shepherd mix. After being trapped as feral, Ozzie was sent to the ASPCA®’s
Behavioral Rehabilitation Center. He made little progress over his first
weeks in the program. Initially he was terrified of both people and dogs. In
an attempt to reduce his incapacitating anxiety, we focused on socializing
him with other dogs first. Only after he became comfortable with conspecifics
was Ozzie able to progress through our other treatment protocols. Social facilitation
proved a useful tool; Ozzie appeared less anxious and more playful
interacting with people and engaging in novel experienc
es when in the presence of confident dogs.
Eventually, Ozzie learned to bond with people, to enjoy being handled and to
feel at ease with strangers. Ozzie graduated from the program after 32 weeks
in treatment and was successfully adopted into a pet home. |
Effects of Therapy Dogs
on Mood States of College Students Scott
Coleman Purpose:
Human interaction with dogs and other domesticated animals affords multiple
physiological and psychological benefits. Numerous studies show a reduction
in anxiety, blood pressure, and heart rate among other well-being indices.
These effects have been identified in critical human populations with cognitive,
development, social, and cardiovascular health disorders. More recently,
research has investigated the impact of human/animal interactions in
pedagogical domains. The present study investigated the effect of
human-animal interactions on the short-term mood states of college students. Method:
Two hundred-forty college students served as participants in this study.
Participants were recruited from a large pool of students that attended
regularly scheduled therapy dog visitation at the central library on the UTA
campus. This study utilized a questionnaire format to assess the mood states
of participants immediately before and after interaction with therapy dogs.
Mood states were measured using the Profile of Mood States short form
(POMS-SF) Shacham (1983). In addition to mood state assessment,
participants indicated areas of physical contact (i.e., petted) on the
therapy dog using a check list. The duration of the interaction with the
therapy dog was also obtained. Thus, the questionnaire provided measurement
of length of time and topographical characteristics of the participants’
human-animal interaction. Results:
As expected, total negative mood disturbance decreased from before (M =
47.60, SE = 1.73) to after (M = 21.61, SE = 1.08) engaging in physical
contact with a therapy dog, F(1, 224) = 368.16, p
< .001, ηp2 = .62. Participants with higher negative mood prior to
the session had larger decreases during the session, b = -0.65, SE = 0.03, t(221) = -20.21, p < .001. However, this effect was
enhanced by both greater time spent with the therapy dogs, b = -0.006, SE =
0.003, t(217) = -2.28, p = .02, as well as the more
total contact areas, b = -0.025, SE = 0.007, t(217) = -3.64, p < .001.
However, time spent and areas touched were only marginally associated, r(223) = .13, p = .05. Conclusions:
College students face challenging day-to-day situations that provoke negative
mood states, stress, and anxiety. Our study demonstrated the efficacy of
instituting an on-campus therapy dog program to ameliorate negative mood in
college students. Given the current
findings, we anticipate the existence of a wide range of therapeutic effects
stemming from human-animal interaction in academic settings. We discuss our
finding in relation to the application of therapy of therapy dog in areas of
research relevant to health psychology.
Future research will investigate the relationships between antecedent
factors, such as attitude toward pets, personality, and test anxiety for the
potential beneficial role of human-animal interactions. |
More than just playing
around Claire
F. Cario By
designing a tool that assesses a dog’s intraspecific sociability while
measuring changes seen over time, we can provide valuable information to
potential adopters, rescues or fosters and evaluate the impact of off leash
interaction among conspecifics in a shelter environment. This information may
also decrease length of stay as well as returns. Animal Care Centers of NYC
is an open admission shelter with an intake of 10,000 plus dogs every year.
In Brooklyn alone, we receive an average of 400 dogs every month. The average
length of stay is between 10-14 days with a handful of long stays here 3
months or more. The primary form of enrichment that is provided is daily
playgroup. Initially the program was introduced to reduce stress and to
assist in the daily cleaning of the kennels. However, it now serves both
those purposes as well as an opportunity to gather behavioral information on
the population and provide socialization sessions for fearful and
under-socialized dogs. The development of a scale that assesses a dog’s level
of sociability, tolerance and energy level in relation to other dogs may
provide a simple, yet informative way to convey behavioral information to adopters, rescues or fosters. This may also may improve
the chance that a dog will be rehomed into an environment that would be most
compatible with who they are. Additionally, we intend to track changes (eg: Day 1, 4, 7, 14, and 30) throughout the dog’s stay to
measure the effect playgroup has on the population. |