Is previous experience important for inhibitory control? Comparison between shelter and pet dogs in A-not-B and cylinder tasks

CARBALLO, F.; FAGNANI, J; BENTOSELA, M. ; BARRERA G.

ANIMAL COGNITION

SPRINGER HEIDELBERG

Lugar: HEIDELBERG; Año: 2016 vol. 19 p. 1165 - 1172

1435-9448

This study compares the performance of twogroups of dogs with different levels of social interactionwith humans, shelter and pet dogs, in two inhibitory controltasks. (1) In the A-not-B task, dogs were required to resistsearching for food in a previously rewarded location, and(2) in the cylinder task, dogs were required to resistapproaching visible food directly in favor of a detourreaching response. Our first aim was to evaluate theimportance of learning and ontogeny in performing inhibitorytasks. Also, we assessed whether there is a correlationbetween the two tasks by comparing performance inthe same subjects. Results showed significant differencesbetween shelter and pet dogs in the A-not-B task, withpoorer performance in shelter dogs. However, no differenceswere found in the cylinder task. The poorer performanceof shelter dogs might be related to their infrequentinteraction with humans, which reduces the chances tolearn to inhibit certain behaviors. This result would highlightthe importance of ontogeny in developing that ability.On the other hand, no correlations were found between thetwo tasks, which contributes information to the debateabout the context specificity of inhibitory control in dogs.