Abstract
Behavioural assessments of shelter dogs (Canis lupus familiaris) typically comprise standardized test batteries conducted at one time point, but test batteries have shown inconsistent predictive validity. Longitudinal behavioural assessments offer an alternative. We modelled longitudinal observational data on shelter dog behaviour using the framework of behavioural reaction norms, partitioning variance into personality (i.e. inter-individual differences in behaviour), plasticity (i.e. inter-individual differences in average behaviour) and predictability (i.e. individual differences in residual intra-individual variation). We analysed data on interactions of 3263 dogs (n = 19 281) with unfamiliar people during their first month after arrival at the shelter. Accounting for personality, plasticity (linear and quadratic trends) and predictability improved the predictive accuracy of the analyses compared to models quantifying personality and/or plasticity only. While dogs were, on average, highly sociable with unfamiliar people and sociability increased over days since arrival, group averages were unrepresentative of all dogs and predictions made at the individual level entailed considerable uncertainty. Effects of demographic variables (e.g. age) on personality, plasticity and predictability were observed. Behavioural repeatability was higher one week after arrival compared to arrival day. Our results highlight the value of longitudinal assessments on shelter dogs and identify measures that could improve the predictive validity of behavioural assessments in shelters.
Highlights
Personality, defined by inter-individual differences in average behaviour, represents just one component of behavioural variation of interest in animal behaviour research
For the two videos depicting interactions with people, consensus was 0.75 for the video showing an example of Reacts to people non-aggressive and 0.77 for the example of Reacts to people aggressive
For the video showing Reacts to people non-aggressive, 77% chose the correct code and 83% a code of the correct colour category, and, as previously reported by Goold & Newberry [35], 52% chose the correct code for the video showing Reacts to people aggressive and 55% chose a code of the correct colour category
Summary
Personality, defined by inter-individual differences in average behaviour, represents just one component of behavioural variation of interest in animal behaviour research. The concept of behavioural reaction norms is built upon the use of hierarchical statistical models to quantify between- and within-individual variation in behaviour, following methods in quantitative genetics [3]. These developments reflect increasing interest across biology in expanding the ‘trait space’ of phenotypic evolution [9] beyond mean trait differences and systematic plasticity across environmental gradients to include residual trait variation (e.g. developmental instability [10,11]; stochastic variation in gene expression [12])
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