Welcome to DU!
The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards.
Join the community:
Create a free account
Support DU (and get rid of ads!):
Become a Star Member
Latest Breaking News
Editorials & Other Articles
General Discussion
The DU Lounge
All Forums
Issue Forums
Culture Forums
Alliance Forums
Region Forums
Support Forums
Help & Search
Your dog is a good boy, but that's not necessarily because of its breed
https://www.npr.org/2022/04/28/1095390872/dog-breeds-behavior-studyYour dog is a good boy, but that's not necessarily because of its breed
APRIL 28, 2022 6:13 PM ET
Becky Sullivan
A border collie in northern England chases after a flock of sheep to herd them. A new study finds that only about 9% of the variation in an individual dog's behavior can be explained by its breed.
Edwin Remsberg/Getty Images
Labrador retrievers fetch, border collies herd, huskies howl: It's conventional wisdom that many dog breeds act in certain ways because they've been bred to do so over the course of many generations.
But a new study to be published Friday in the journal Science finds that though some dog behaviors are indeed associated with particular breeds, breed plays less of a role overall than that conventional wisdom holds.
"We found things like German shorthaired pointers were slightly more likely to point, or golden retrievers were slightly more likely to retrieve, or huskies more likely to howl, than the general dog population," says Kathryn Lord, a researcher at the UMass Chan Medical School and an author of the study.
Researchers surveyed the owners of more than 18,000 dogs and analyzed the DNA of about 2,100 animals to see if physical traits and behaviors can be correlated with dog breeds.
[...]
APRIL 28, 2022 6:13 PM ET
Becky Sullivan
A border collie in northern England chases after a flock of sheep to herd them. A new study finds that only about 9% of the variation in an individual dog's behavior can be explained by its breed.
Edwin Remsberg/Getty Images
Labrador retrievers fetch, border collies herd, huskies howl: It's conventional wisdom that many dog breeds act in certain ways because they've been bred to do so over the course of many generations.
But a new study to be published Friday in the journal Science finds that though some dog behaviors are indeed associated with particular breeds, breed plays less of a role overall than that conventional wisdom holds.
"We found things like German shorthaired pointers were slightly more likely to point, or golden retrievers were slightly more likely to retrieve, or huskies more likely to howl, than the general dog population," says Kathryn Lord, a researcher at the UMass Chan Medical School and an author of the study.
Researchers surveyed the owners of more than 18,000 dogs and analyzed the DNA of about 2,100 animals to see if physical traits and behaviors can be correlated with dog breeds.
[...]
====================
https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abk0639
Ancestry-inclusive dog genomics challenges popular breed stereotypes
KATHLEEN MORRILL , JESSICA HEKMAN, XUE LI, JESSE MCCLURE, AND ELINOR K. KARLSSON +20 authors Authors Info & Affiliations
SCIENCE
29 Apr 2022
Vol 376, Issue 6592
DOI: 10.1126/science.abk0639
What is your dog like?
Modern domestic dog breeds are only ~160 years old and are the result of selection for specific cosmetic traits. To investigate how genetics aligns with breed characteristics, Morrill et al. sequenced the DNA of more than 2000 purebred and mixed-breed dogs. These data, coupled with owner surveys, were used to map genes associated with behavioral and physical traits. Although many physical traits were associated with breeds, behavior was much more variable among individual dogs. In general, physical trait heritability was a greater predictor of breed but was not necessarily a predictor of breed ancestry in mutts. Among behavioral traits, biddability—how well dogs respond to human direction—was the most heritable by breed but varied significantly among individual dogs. Thus, dog breed is generally a poor predictor of individual behavior and should not be used to inform decisions relating to selection of a pet dog. —LMZ
Structured Abstract
INTRODUCTION
Before the 1800s, dogs were probably primarily selected for functional roles such as hunting, guarding, and herding. Modern dog breeds are a recent invention defined by conformation to a physical ideal and purity of lineage. Breeds are commonly ascribed temperaments and behavioral proclivities based on the purported function of the ancestral source population. By extension, the breed ancestry of individual dogs is assumed to be predictive of temperament and behavior. Through our community science project Darwin’s Ark (darwinsark.org), we enrolled a diverse cohort of pet dogs to explore how genetics shapes complex behavioral traits in this exceptional natural model.
RATIONALE
Dogs are a natural system for investigating the genetics of complex traits. Millions of pet dogs live in human homes, sharing our environment, and receive sophisticated medical care. Behavioral disorders are treated with human psychiatric drugs, achieving similar response rates, and genetic studies suggest shared etiology with some human psychiatric conditions.
We developed Darwin’s Ark as an open data resource for collecting owner-reported phenotypes and genetic data and invited any dog owner to enroll their dog. We paired this with low-pass sequencing to capture nearly all common variation in this outbred population. Our inclusive approach achieved the large samples needed to investigate complex traits.
RESULTS
We surveyed owners of 18,385 dogs (49% purebred) and sequenced the DNA of 2155 dogs. Most behavioral traits are heritable [heritability (h2) > 25%], but behavior only subtly differentiates breeds. Breed offers little predictive value for individuals, explaining just 9% of variation in behavior. For more heritable, more breed-differentiated traits, like biddability (responsiveness to direction and commands), knowing breed ancestry can make behavioral predictions somewhat more accurate (see the figure). For less heritable, less breed-differentiated traits, like agonistic threshold (how easily a dog is provoked by frightening or uncomfortable stimuli), breed is almost uninformative.
[...]
KATHLEEN MORRILL , JESSICA HEKMAN, XUE LI, JESSE MCCLURE, AND ELINOR K. KARLSSON +20 authors Authors Info & Affiliations
SCIENCE
29 Apr 2022
Vol 376, Issue 6592
DOI: 10.1126/science.abk0639
What is your dog like?
Modern domestic dog breeds are only ~160 years old and are the result of selection for specific cosmetic traits. To investigate how genetics aligns with breed characteristics, Morrill et al. sequenced the DNA of more than 2000 purebred and mixed-breed dogs. These data, coupled with owner surveys, were used to map genes associated with behavioral and physical traits. Although many physical traits were associated with breeds, behavior was much more variable among individual dogs. In general, physical trait heritability was a greater predictor of breed but was not necessarily a predictor of breed ancestry in mutts. Among behavioral traits, biddability—how well dogs respond to human direction—was the most heritable by breed but varied significantly among individual dogs. Thus, dog breed is generally a poor predictor of individual behavior and should not be used to inform decisions relating to selection of a pet dog. —LMZ
Structured Abstract
INTRODUCTION
Before the 1800s, dogs were probably primarily selected for functional roles such as hunting, guarding, and herding. Modern dog breeds are a recent invention defined by conformation to a physical ideal and purity of lineage. Breeds are commonly ascribed temperaments and behavioral proclivities based on the purported function of the ancestral source population. By extension, the breed ancestry of individual dogs is assumed to be predictive of temperament and behavior. Through our community science project Darwin’s Ark (darwinsark.org), we enrolled a diverse cohort of pet dogs to explore how genetics shapes complex behavioral traits in this exceptional natural model.
RATIONALE
Dogs are a natural system for investigating the genetics of complex traits. Millions of pet dogs live in human homes, sharing our environment, and receive sophisticated medical care. Behavioral disorders are treated with human psychiatric drugs, achieving similar response rates, and genetic studies suggest shared etiology with some human psychiatric conditions.
We developed Darwin’s Ark as an open data resource for collecting owner-reported phenotypes and genetic data and invited any dog owner to enroll their dog. We paired this with low-pass sequencing to capture nearly all common variation in this outbred population. Our inclusive approach achieved the large samples needed to investigate complex traits.
RESULTS
We surveyed owners of 18,385 dogs (49% purebred) and sequenced the DNA of 2155 dogs. Most behavioral traits are heritable [heritability (h2) > 25%], but behavior only subtly differentiates breeds. Breed offers little predictive value for individuals, explaining just 9% of variation in behavior. For more heritable, more breed-differentiated traits, like biddability (responsiveness to direction and commands), knowing breed ancestry can make behavioral predictions somewhat more accurate (see the figure). For less heritable, less breed-differentiated traits, like agonistic threshold (how easily a dog is provoked by frightening or uncomfortable stimuli), breed is almost uninformative.
[...]
1 replies
= new reply since forum marked as read
= new reply since forum marked as read
