Differences in greeting behaviour towards humans with varying levels of familiarity in hand-reared wolves (Canis lupus).

Socialized wolves' relationship with humans is a much debated, but important question in light of dog domestication. Earlier findings reported no attachment to the caretaker at four months of age in a Strange Situation Test, while recently attachment to the caretaker was reported at a few weeks of age in a similar paradigm. To explore wolf-human relationship, we analysed behaviours of hand reared, extensively socialized wolves towards four visitor types: foster-parents, close acquaintances, persons met once before, and complete strangers during a greeting episode. As hypothesized, in the greeting context subjects showed more intense and friendly behaviour towards foster-parents, than other visitor types, which may reflect familiarity and affinity. However, differences were more pronounced in the group situation (at six months of age) than in the individual situation (at 12 and 24 months), suggesting that unique status of foster parents may become less distinct as wolves get older, while exploration of novel social agents is expressed more with older age. Fear related behaviour patterns were only found in the individual situation, mainly displayed towards strangers. We showed that, in case of extensively socialized wolves, distinctive affiliation and affinity towards the foster parent prevails into adulthood

Data from: Differences in greeting behaviour towards humans with varying levels of familiarity in hand-reared wolves (Canis lupus)

Socialized wolves' relationship with humans is a much debated, but important question in light of dog domestication. Earlier findings reported no attachment to the caretaker at four months of age in a Strange Situation Test, while recently attachment to the caretaker was reported at a few weeks of age in a similar paradigm. To explore wolf–human relationship, we analysed behaviours of hand reared, extensively socialized wolves towards four visitor types: foster-parents, close acquaintances, persons met once before, and complete strangers during a greeting episode. As hypothesized, in the greeting context subjects showed more intense and friendly behaviour towards foster-parents, than other visitor types, which may reflect familiarity and affinity. However, differences were more pronounced in the group situation (at six months of age) than in the individual situation (at 12 and 24 months), suggesting that unique status of foster parents may become less distinct as wolves get older, while exploration of novel social agents is expressed more with older age. Fear related behaviour patterns were only found in the individual situation, mainly displayed towards strangers. We showed that, in case of extensively socialized wolves, distinctive affiliation and affinity towards the foster parent prevails into adulthood

The difference between two brachycephalic and one mesocephalic dog breeds’ problem-solving performance suggests evidence for paedomorphism in behaviour

Abstract Despite serious health and longevity problems, small brachycephalic breeds are becoming increasingly popular among pet owners. Motivations for choosing short-nosed breeds have been extensively investigated in recent years; however, this issue has been addressed mainly by relying on owner reports, resulting in explanations of “cute looks”, referring to the baby-schema phenomenon and “behaviour well suited for companionship”. We aimed to compare the behaviour of two brachycephalic (English and French bulldogs) and one mesocephalic (Mudi) breed in a problem-solving context. The dogs were given the task of opening boxes containing food rewards. We investigated human-directed behaviour elements over success and latency (indicators of motivation and ability). We found that both English and French bulldogs were significantly less successful in solving the problem than mudis. Both brachycephalic breeds had longer opening latencies than the mesocephalic breed. Brachycephalic breeds oriented less at the problem box and more at humans present. In summary, the short-headed breeds were less successful but oriented much more toward humans than mesocephalic dogs. Owners might interpret these behaviours as “helplessness” and dependence. The results support the hypothesis that infant-like traits may be present not only in appearance but also in behaviour in brachycephalic breeds, eliciting caring behaviour in owners

GroupDataEXP1

Raw data EXP

GreetingSTATdataTable

Wolf greeting experiments, raw dat

Hogyan hat a mobileszköz-használat az óvodások figyelmére és társas-kognitív készségeire?

Az érintőképernyős mobileszközöket (ÉKM: okostelefonok és tabletek) egyre többet és egyre fiatalabb korban használják a gyerekek. Ekkor az agy még nagyon plasztikus, így az ÉKM-használat befolyásolhatja a kognitív fejlődést, ami új kihívásokat támaszt a szülőkkel és pedagógusokkal szemben. Egy keresztmetszeti vizsgálatban összehasonlítottuk az ÉKM-eszközöket gyakran használó és az ilyen eszközöket nem használó óvodás korú gyerekek (szelektív és megosztott) figyelmi és szociokognitív képességeit. Majd kísérletesen vizsgáltuk, hogy miképp befolyásolja a gyerekek figyelmi teljesítményét, ha előzőleg (előkezelés) egy gyors vagy lassú sebességű digitális játékkal vagy egy nem digitális játékkal játszanak. A szelektív figyelmi feladatban a gyerekek figyelmére (ÉKM-használattól függetlenül) a globális fókusz volt jellemző (jobban teljesítettek, ha az egészre kellett figyelni, mint ha a részletre), a megosztott figyelmi feladatban azonban az ÉKM-használók atipikus, lokális fókuszt mutattak (jobban teljesítettek, amikor a kis ábra volt a célinger, mint amikor a nagy), és teljesítményük a globális próbákban elmaradt az ÉKM-eket nem használó gyerekekétől. Az ÉKM-használók gyengébb tudatelméleti teljesítményt mutattak, viszont az érzelmek felismerésében nem különböztek az ÉKM-et nem használóktól. Az előkezelésen alapuló vizsgálatunk a figyelmi működéssel kapcsolatos eredményeket kísérletesen is megerősítette: a tesztet megelőzően digitális játékkal játszó gyerekek globális fókuszt mutattak a szelektív feladatban és lokális fókuszt a megosztott figyelmi feladatban, a nem-digitális játék után viszont mindkét feladatban globális fókusz volt jellemző. Míg a nem-digitális és a lassú digitális játékkal játszó gyerekek a szelektív figyelmi feladatban jobban teljesítettek, mint a megosztottban, addig a gyors digitális játékkal játszók nem mutattak ilyen előnyt a szelektív figyelmi feladatban. Eredményeink azt mutatják, hogy az ÉKM-eszközök rövid- és hosszútávú használata és azon belül a digitális játékokkal való játék lokális figyelmi fókuszhoz vezet, talán azért, mert a digitális képernyők lokális információkban gazdagok, és ritkán látszódik egyben az egész kép. A gyors digitális játék, azáltal, hogy párhuzamosan több ingerre kell figyelni, a megosztott figyelmet fejleszti, de a szelektív figyelmet nem. Az ÉKM-használat elveszi az időt a társas tevékenységektől, ami magyarázhatja, hogy az ÉKM-használóknak nehézségeik vannak a komplexebb szociokognitív képességek terén (tudatelmélet). Eredményeink fontos ismereteket nyújtanak és irányt mutatnak a pedagógia és a pszichológia számára

Representation of rewards differing in their hedonic valence in the caudate nucleus correlates with the performance in a problem-solving task in dogs (Canis familiaris)

We have investigated dogs’ ( Canis familiaris ) abilities in associating different sounds with appetitive stimuli of different incentive values. The association’s establishment was first tested on family dogs (n = 20) in a problem-solving behavioural paradigm (experiment 1), then in a problem-solving behavioural paradigm as well as an fMRI study on specially trained family dogs (n = 20) (experiment 2). The aim was to show behavioural and parallel neural effects of the association formed between the two sounds and two different associated appetitive stimuli. The latency of solving the problem was considered an indicator of the motivational state. In our first experiment, where only behaviour was studied, we found that dogs were quicker in solving a problem upon hearing the sound associated with food higher in reward value, suggesting that they have successfully associated the sounds with the corresponding food value. In our second experiment, this behaviour difference was not significant. In the fMRI study, the cerebral response to the two sounds was compared both before and after the associative training. Two bilateral regions of interest were explored: the caudate nucleus and the amygdala. After the associative training, the response in the caudate nucleus was higher to the sound related to a higher reward value food than to the sound related to a lower reward value food, which difference was not present before the associative training. We found an increase in the amygdala response to both sounds after the training. In a whole-brain representational similarity analysis, we found that cerebral patterns in the caudate nucleus to the two sounds were different only after the training. Moreover, we found a positive correlation between the dissimilarity index in the caudate nucleus for activation responses to the two sounds and the difference in latencies (i.e. high reward value associated sound condition latency—low reward value associated sound condition latency) to solve the behavioural task: the bigger the difference between the conditions in latency to solve the task, the greater the difference in the neural representation of the two sounds was. In summary, family dogs’ brain activation patterns reflected their expectations based on what they learned about the relationship between two sounds and their associated appetitive stimuli