Breed differences in domestic dogs’ (Canis familiaris) emission of communicative signals

JAKOVCEVIC, A.; ELGIER, A; BARRERA, G; MUSTACA, A; BENTOSELA, M

Melbourne, EEUU

Congreso; 17 th International Conference on Comparative Cognition; 2010

Domestic dogs have important abilities to communicate with humans. Recent studies reported breed differences in dogs’ comprehension of communicative signals (pointing). The present studies show the existence of such differences but in the production of gazing to the human face in a conflictive situation with food at sight but out of reach. Three different breed groups were evaluated (Retriever, Sheepdog and Companion). Two different studies were performed, one involving the training and extinction of the gaze response and the other a gazing test without previous training. In both tasks, when the human did not deliver food, Retrievers gaze toward it significantly more than Sheepdogs or Companion dogs. These differences maybe related to temperament traits as sociability, leading to the more social breeds to remain near and gazing at the human even when this response is no successful. A significant positive correlation between gaze duration and duration of physical contact with an unknown human in a sociability test supports this hypothesis. Taking together, results suggest that communicative abilities in dogs are variable, and that may depend on multiple factors as learning, genetics and differential selection of temperament traits in the different breeds.