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Study of pet dogs shows breed does not predict behaviour

nature.com

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Re: Study of pet dogs shows breed does not predict behaviour

#161

Post by _aavaa_ »

astrange wrote: post #119
_aavaa_ wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe that means something different to me than it does to you, but you definitely can make predictions about individuals. Is that not what a prior? If I hear that someone is 12 years old and I know nothing else about them, then assuming their height is the mode for that age group is as good of a prediction as you can make.

A more important point is that the instant you meet someone, you have far more information about them than knowing their genetics would give you. So it'd be strange to meet a Dutch person and go "hah, by your genetics I predict you're 190cm tall" if you're looking at them and they're short.

Yes. But until then all you have with are the statistics.

Re: Study of pet dogs shows breed does not predict behaviour

#162

Post by hirvi74 »

echelon wrote: post #34
ShockTohp wrote: post #7

From the source: "The team found that some traits were more common in certain breeds. For example, compared with a random dog, German shepherds were more easily directed; beagles, not so much. And the authors’ genetic studies revealed that mixed-breed dogs with a particular ancestry were more likely to act in specific ways. Mutts with St Bernard ancestry, for instance, were more affectionate, whereas mutts descended…

This study/paper is ridiculous. Anecdotal, but I've had lots of dogs growing up. We have five right now. This does not reflect the reality I know. Shiba inu act like cats and prefer to spend time away from their person. They frequently get kicked out of dog parks for not being friendly to other dogs. It's documented and well-studied. They're not at all like other dogs. Corgis are protective, commandeering, and can be…

> Shiba inu act like cats and prefer to spend time away from their person. They frequently get kicked out of dog parks for not being friendly to other dogs. It's documented and well-studied. They're not at all like other dogs.

Came to these comments just for this breed.

Mine is identical to what you describe except he is pretty friendly to other dogs, but my SO and I had to do a ton or work socializing him when he was young.

Re: Study of pet dogs shows breed does not predict behaviour

#163

Post by [deleted] »

defen wrote: post #114
randomblast wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you read the paper? They derived 8 behavioural factors from the survey questions, and there are a few which are very relevant to dog-human aggression. #1: Human sociability #2: Arousal level #4: Biddability #5: Agonistic threshold (agonistic is the behavioural term encompassing aggression) Those are probably the most relevant. There is an important consideration which does seem to be missing from the study, but o…

I did; do you understand why I am saying "DOG leaves food or objects alone when told to do so" or "DOG is quick to sneak out through open doors, gates" or "DOG is slow to respond to corrections" (among many other questions) are utterly irrelevant when people consider why certain types of dogs are dangerous? > Most, if not all of these factors can be altered with behaviour modification (training). What percentage of d…

[deleted]

Re: Study of pet dogs shows breed does not predict behaviour

#164

Post by sacrosancty »

jamesash wrote: post #59
sacrosancty wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Heritability of traits is a really messy and difficult problem. Sere, you can breed tameness into wild foxes, but that doesn't mean you can easily breed more tameness into already tame foxes/dogs. There might be some low-hanging fruit that's easy to exploit and after that, it's mostly random chance and the environment that determines things. But that again depends on what the environment is like - if all dog owners r…

One can start with an already tame population of foxes/dogs and select for aggression. Aggression would be a useful trait in a breed desired for protection/guarding.

People have been doing that and yet somehow those aggressive breeds still frequently produce harmless puppies, so it's not obvious that breeders have actually achieved it. Maybe dogs have been domesticated for so long that we can't undo their behavior with just a couple of hundred years. Or maybe we can. It's hard, not obvious.

Re: Study of pet dogs shows breed does not predict behaviour

#165

Post by daniel-cussen »

That's like the whole point of breeding. For instance breeding against pit bulls who attacked their master, that's a behavior, I guess they wasted time and dogs culling those dogs instead of breeding them.

So I guess kids who want a specific dog type should just go by weight? Hey Timmy how much dog biomass you want for your birthday?

Re: Study of pet dogs shows breed does not predict behaviour

#166

Post by daniel-cussen »

ShockTohp wrote: post #7

From the source: "The team found that some traits were more common in certain breeds. For example, compared with a random dog, German shepherds were more easily directed; beagles, not so much. And the authors’ genetic studies revealed that mixed-breed dogs with a particular ancestry were more likely to act in specific ways. Mutts with St Bernard ancestry, for instance, were more affectionate, whereas mutts descended…

Yeah well the headline says the variation is exactly 0, then you read and it says 9%, which means if you look at their data it says like 38%.

Re: Study of pet dogs shows breed does not predict behaviour

#167

Post by User23 »

TameAntelope wrote: post #120
User23 wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Race does not exist, genetically. Period. And yet ancestry.com can comfortably tell anyone which continental scale human population or populations they are descended from and that happens to map pretty neatly to the US Census Bureau's notion of race. Being aware that major geographic features of the Earth such as the Atlantic Ocean, the Himalayas, and the Sahara Desert were more or less impermeable barriers to gene…

Ancestry.com simply does not do what you're claiming here. The whole "fun" of ancestry.com is that each person who does it shows up in surprising places across the globe, regardless of their supposed "race", because genetics don't adhere to any concept of "race" as it exists in culture. And the this Barrier Theory was proposed by eugenicists in the 20s and thoroughly debunked by the 30s.

Please tell us more about the significant gene flow between Europe and North America prior to the Age of Sail.

Re: Study of pet dogs shows breed does not predict behaviour

#168

Post by [deleted] »

ShockTohp wrote: post #7

From the source: "The team found that some traits were more common in certain breeds. For example, compared with a random dog, German shepherds were more easily directed; beagles, not so much. And the authors’ genetic studies revealed that mixed-breed dogs with a particular ancestry were more likely to act in specific ways. Mutts with St Bernard ancestry, for instance, were more affectionate, whereas mutts descended…

[deleted]

Re: Study of pet dogs shows breed does not predict behaviour

#169

Post by livinglist »

echelon wrote: post #34
ShockTohp wrote: post #7

From the source: "The team found that some traits were more common in certain breeds. For example, compared with a random dog, German shepherds were more easily directed; beagles, not so much. And the authors’ genetic studies revealed that mixed-breed dogs with a particular ancestry were more likely to act in specific ways. Mutts with St Bernard ancestry, for instance, were more affectionate, whereas mutts descended…

This study/paper is ridiculous. Anecdotal, but I've had lots of dogs growing up. We have five right now. This does not reflect the reality I know. Shiba inu act like cats and prefer to spend time away from their person. They frequently get kicked out of dog parks for not being friendly to other dogs. It's documented and well-studied. They're not at all like other dogs. Corgis are protective, commandeering, and can be…

I have an Akita and also my previous one was also an Akita, and I bring my dogs to dog parks pretty frequently, I also have a group of people who also have Akita, and my observation is that Akita tends to be loyal but lazy af… they literally been lying on the ground all days long, and not that interested in toys too…

Re: Study of pet dogs shows breed does not predict behaviour

#170

Post by cancelkooks »

etempleton wrote: post #155
defen wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The author says "We found no support for policies targeting particular breeds" [1] which is completely absurd even if you postulate that their study's results were even stronger than they are. Imagine that their study found zero correlation between breeds and behavior. Even if that were the case, the outcomes of that behavior are wildly different. Some breeds will bite you and not even break skin. Some breeds will bi…

Never leave a child alone with any unknown dog. Or really any dog known or not. Children have the bad habit of getting in dogs faces, pulling their ears, etc and don’t always understand a dogs warninings. Yes, a bigger, stronger dog has the potential for more damage if it becomes aggressive. Funny you use chihuahua as a counter example, because their reputation is for aggression. A chihuahua is less dangerous because…

> Funny you use chihuahua as a counter example, because their reputation is for aggression. A chihuahua is less dangerous because it is smaller not because it is inherently less aggressive.

I believe that was the argument made: presupposing a lack of correlation between breed and behavior, a tiny dog is less dangerous than a large one.

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