Selecting Dogs for Explosives Detection: Behavioral Characteristics.

Lucia Lazarowski,Bart Rogers,Craig Angle,Lowell Paul Waggoner,Melissa Singletary,Sarah Krichbaum,Pamela Haney

doi:10.3389/fvets.2020.00597

Abstract

Detection dogs are widely considered the most effective and adaptive method for explosives detection. Increases in emerging sophisticated threats are accelerating the demand for highly capable explosives detection, causing a strain on available supplies of quality canines worldwide. These strains are further compounded by rigorous behavioral standards required to meet mission-specific capabilities, leading to high rates of dogs disqualified from training or deployment. Ample research has explored the behavioral characteristics important for assistance, guide, and other traditional working roles, while those corresponding to more specialized tasks such as detection of explosives are not as well-understood. In this review we aim to identify the behavioral characteristics important for operational tasks of explosives detection dogs, contrasting with that of other working roles and highlighting key differences between explosives and other types of detection dogs. Further, we review the available research on methods for assessing and selecting candidate detection dogs and make recommendations for future directions and applications to the industry. Improvements and standardization in assessment technology allowing for the identification and enhancement of behavioral characteristics will be key to advancing canine detection technology in general.

Highlights

Increasing recognition of the detection dog as the most capable and adaptable method for realtime detection of explosives has led to a world-wide increase in their use in security and military operations, which is straining the supply of dogs capable of performing explosives detection [1]
We highlight the behavioral characteristics that appear to be critical in the selection of explosive detection dogs (EDD)
Many of these characteristics are similar to those desired in other types of working dogs such as search and rescue, conservation, protection/patrol, and even assistance and guide dogs, which require high levels of motivation, trainability, and the ability to work in potentially stressful environments

Summary

Introduction

Increasing recognition of the detection dog as the most capable and adaptable method for realtime detection of explosives has led to a world-wide increase in their use in security and military operations, which is straining the supply of dogs capable of performing explosives detection [1]. The U.S Congress has stated that U.S dependence on foreign procurement and a lack of domestic production of explosive detection dogs (EDD) presents a critical security gap [(2), 115th U.S Congress]. Military and security officials from numerous nations attending the 2019 International Working Dog Conference of the International Working Dog Breeding Association noted the dwindling supply of suitable candidate EDDs from traditional private sources. EDDs are primarily sourced from populations of dogs that have been selectively bred for hundreds of years for hunting, herding, and protection [3, 4]. Substance detection tasks, which mostly occur in the context of intense human activity such as urban landscapes, are a relatively recent application of dogs for which there has been very limited directed selective breeding

Objectives

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Conclusion