what makes dogs special? · • wolves persist: dogs look to human for help udell (2015) bio. lett....

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What Makes Dogs Special?

Clive D. L. Wynne, Ph.D.

Arizona State University

What makes dogs special?

Selection for human-like social

skillHare & Tomasello, (2005), TICS


Udell, et al. (2008) Anim. Behav.

Following pointing gestures

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What makes dogs special?Understanding what people see & know

Condition 1: BackturnedUdell, et al. (2011) Learn. & Behav.

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Condition 2: Book

Condition 3: Bucket

What makes dogs special?Understanding what people see & know

Udell, et al. (2011) Learn. & Behav.

0.0

2.5

5.0

7.5

10.0

Backturned Book Bucket

Mean

co

rrect

ch

oic

es

(/10)

Pet Dogs Indoors

Wolves

Shelter dogs

** *

*


Understanding what people see & know

Udell, et al. (2011) Learn. & Behav.

What makes dogs special?• Not their cognition

• Dogs learn to follow human actions becauseo They are socialized to humans at critical period

o They depend on human action for fulfillment of all needs

o Human actions predicting motivated consequences engage Pavlovian and operant conditioning mechanisms

o Two Stage Hypothesis: Responsiveness to humans = Socialization + Conditioning

9Udell, et al. (2010) Bio. Rev.

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Florida’s Canine Cognition and Behavior Lab was led

at the time of my visit by psychologist Clive Wynne, a

former pigeon researcher considered by some to be

the Debbie Downer of the canine cognition field.


What makes dogs special? Development

Free-living dogs in West Bengal, India

82% mortality in first year

Free living dogs in Italy

Radio-tracked 9 adults, 4 years

40 pups

Only 2 reached adulthood

Pal, S.K., (2001), Acta Theriol.

Boitani, et al., (1995), In The Domestic Dog…

What makes dogs special?• Development

• Free living dogs die young

• Saved by human intervention?

• Kindchenschema

• But is it possible to be too young to be cute?

Chersini, et al., (2018), Anthrozoos

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What makes dogs special?• 51 humans rated attractiveness of photos of pups

o Jack Russell

o Cane Corso

o White Shepherd

• From birth to 7 months

Cane Corso Jack Russell Terrier White Shepherd

40

50

60

70

80

0 10 20 30 0 10 20 30 0 10 20 30

Age in Weeks

Attra

ctive

ness R

ating

Breed

Cane Corso

Jack Russell Terrier

White Shepherd


40

50

60

70

80

0 10 20 30 0 10 20 30 0 10 20 30

Age in Weeks

Attra

ctive

ness R

ating

Breed

Cane Corso


White Shepherd


40

50

60

70

80

0 10 20 30 0 10 20 30 0 10 20 30

Age in Weeks

Attr

activ

enes

s R

atin

g

Breed

Cane Corso


White Shepherd


40

50

60

70

80

0 10 20 30 0 10 20 30 0 10 20 30

Age in Weeks

Attr

activ

enes

s R

atin

g

Breed

Cane Corso


White Shepherd


40

50

60

70

80

0 10 20 30 0 10 20 30 0 10 20 30

Age in Weeks

Attr

activ

enes

s R

atin

g

Breed

Cane Corso


White Shepherd


40

50

60

70

80

0 10 20 30 0 10 20 30 0 10 20 30

Age in Weeks

Attr

activ

enes

s R

atin

g

Breed

Cane Corso


White Shepherd


40

50

60

70

80

0 10 20 30 0 10 20 30 0 10 20 30

Age in Weeks

Attr

activ

enes

s R

atin

g

Breed

Cane Corso


White Shepherd


40

50

60

70

80

0 10 20 30 0 10 20 30 0 10 20 30

Age in Weeks

Attr

activ

enes

s R

atin

g

Breed

Cane Corso


White Shepherd

7.7 weeks 6.3 weeks 8.3 weeks


What makes dogs special?Cane Corso

Least attractive

(younger)

0 weeks

Least attractive

(older)

7 months

Most attractive

(6-8 weeks)

Jack

Russell

White Shepherd


What makes dogs special?• Development

• Many aspects of behavioral development are unique to dogs

• And contribute to dogs’ success in anthropogenic environments

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What makes dogs special?• Affliation

• Behavior Outside the Kennel

Protopopova & Wynne (2014), Appl. Anim. Behav. Sci.

What makes dogs special?• Ethogram of dog/human

interaction outside kennel

Protopopova & Wynne (2014), Appl. Anim. Behav. Sci.

What makes dogs special?• What makes a difference to

adoption chances?

• Affiliation

Protopopova & Wynne (2014), App Anim Behav Sci

Behavior Odds Ratio

Ignore play initiation 0.1

Lie in proximity 14.5

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• Sociability

25

Bentosela et al. (2016) J. Exp. Anal. Behav.

0.00

20.00

40.00

60.00

80.00

100.00

120.00

WolvesDogs

Pro

xim

ity

tim

e (

s)


vonHoldt et al. (2010) Nature

Furthermore, we observed a single SNP with a high FST value located near

the WBSCR17 gene responsible for Williams–Beuren syndrome in humans

(OMIM accession 194050; Supplementary Fig. 16), which is characterized by

social traits such as exceptional gregariousness. These outlier SNPs provide

specific candidate regions for fine-scale mapping of genes that are important in the

early domestication of dogs.

What makes dogs special?• Williams-Beuren Syndrome

• Neurodevelopmental disorder caused by a 1.5-1.8Mb hemizygous deletion on human chromosome 7q11.23 spanning approximately 28 genes

• Characterized by o delayed development,

o cognitive impairment,

o behavioral abnormalities,

o heightened propensity to initiate social contact commonly referred to as “hyper-sociability”

vonHoldt et al. (2010) Nature

https://www-nature-com.ezproxy1.lib.asu.edu/articles/nature08837#s1

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What makes dogs special?• Williams syndrome in dogs?

• Dogs display hyper-sociability in the absence of superior social cognition

• Tested 18 dogs and 9 hand-reared wolves ono Solvable task

o Sociability test

28

vonHoldt et al. (2017) Sci. Adv.

What makes dogs special?• Dogs and wolves given a solvable

task

• Wolves persist: Dogs look to human for help

Udell (2015) Bio. Lett.

What makes dogs special?• Dogs display hyper-sociability in the absence of superior social

cognition

• Tested 18 dogs and 9 hand-reared wolves ono Solvable task

o Sociability test

• Calculatedo attentional bias to social stimuli (solvable task),

o hyper-sociability (sociability test)

o social interest in strangers (sociability test)


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• Gene-behavior associations

31

Attentional bias to social stimuli

Hyper-sociability

Social interest in strangers


What makes dogs special?• Dogs display hyper-sociability in the absence of superior social

cognition

• WBS Chromosome Region 17 (WBSCR17), high significance to be under positive selection as a domestication candidate and was significantly depleted of heterozygosity in the dog

• GTF2I and GTF2IRD1, members of the TFII-I family of transcription factors, repeatedly linked to the expression of hyper-sociability in mice, and specifically implicated in the hyper-sociable phenotype of persons with WBS


What makes dogs special?Dogs get lost hundreds of times and no one ever notices it or sends an account of it to a scientific magazine, but let one find his way from Brooklyn to Yonkers and the fact immediately becomes a circulating anecdote.

Thorndike 1898, p. 4

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Macpherson & Roberts, 2006, J Comp Psych


Joshua van Bourg & Jordan Patterson: 2 months ago


Hyde Park, LondonCemetery in use 1881-1903.

What makes dogs special?Sociability

Affiliation

Love

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Thank You Collaboratory

Monique Udell, Ph.D.

Nicole Dorey, Ph.D.

Erica Feuerbacher, Ph.D.

Nathan Hall, Ph.D.

Sasha Protopopova, Ph.D.

Lindsay Mehrkam, Ph.D.

Lisa Gunter, Ph.D.

Joshua Van Bourg, B.S.

what makes dogs special? · • wolves persist: dogs look to human for help udell (2015) bio. lett....

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