Canine Science Collaboratory

The Canine Science Collaboratory will be at the Conference on Comparative Cognition (CO3) in Montreal later this week! Stop by and check out our lab's recent research on dogs' social development and human perceptions of animal intelligence and emotions.

Happy International Pet Day! Today we celebrated the human-animal bond with three incredible dogs: easygoing Hunter (top right), sporty Charm (bottom left), and gentle Kona Bean (bottom right). We were also visited by fun-loving Brodie (top left) earlier this week, who showed us his favorite toy in the attachment task.

All of these paw-ticipants are helping us learn more about how early life experiences shape dogs' adult behavior. This will inform how we think about breeding practices, rearing strategies, and dog training class curricula.

Your dog can contribute to science too! Take our survey to tell us about them and sign up to be contacted for in-person studies: 👉 https://survey.liu.se/Survey/13574

People and pups are really enjoying our new study

We've been busy getting our new attachment & sociability studies up and running, and we would like to acknowledge our first participants! Nosework buddies Raven (left) and Gabe (right) got us off to a great start earlier this week. (Gabe even generously visited on his birthday!)

Want to tell us about your dog? Take our survey here! 👉 https://survey.liu.se/Survey/13574

Big thanks to sisters Maisie & Beezus (and their mom, undergraduate RA Savannah Padwe) for being the first pilot participants for our new attachment & sociability tasks conducted in collaboration with the Canid Research Group at Linköpings universitet!

Want to participate with your pup? Take our survey to tell us more about your dog: 👉 https://survey.liu.se/Survey/13574

The current wave of in-person sessions is being conducted in Tempe, AZ, but will be extended to other areas of the US (and abroad) as the project develops. Stay tuned!

Our lab is working with a local rescue to explore how early life experiences influence adult behavior! 🐾

Do you have a dog? Want to help us learn more about dog behavior? Take our survey!👉 https://survey.liu.se/Survey/13574

Don't have a dog, but know someone who does? Click "share" to let others know about our research. No matter the dog — big, small, old, young, purebred or a mysterious mix — we want to hear about them!🐾

Our lab will be presenting posters at SPSP 2026 in Chicago on Thursday, Feb. 26 and Saturday, Feb. 28. If you plan to attend the conference, stop by and check out some of our recent research!

Full conference schedule here: https://spsp.org/events/annual-convention/schedule/full-schedule

Five more points stemming from our study, “Comparison of the Efficacy and Welfare of Different Training Methods in Stopping Chasing Behavior in Dogs.”

1. Trainers who claim to believe that positive reinforcement is the best way to effect behavior change completely undermine their case when their first reaction when anyone disagrees with them is to come after that person in the most punitive way possible.

2. Trainers who are members of professional associations like the IAABC, CCPDT and the APDT, have an obligation, outlined in the ethical principles they signed, to be respectful of colleagues and other professionals.

3. If you really have to offer criticism, please email me at [email protected]. Leave Anamarie Johnson out of this. I can’t believe the kind of puerile drivel she is being subjected to. You should be ashamed of yourselves. You are bringing your profession into disrepute.

4. So many of you feel you could easily have done a much better study. That’s wonderful! I look forward to reading those studies in the near future.

5. Two points have been raised in discussion that are worth answering:
a. People are very interested in the identities of the trainers we worked with. I am not aware of any prior study that named the trainers they engaged. Our ambition was to publish a study that was more thorough and complete than those that had gone before and so we named our trainers. We are very grateful to them for their time and expertise, but at no point did they contribute to the design (or analysis, or write-up) of the study. That is solely the responsibility of the two named authors.
b. There is also a lot of concern about the two dogs whose data were not reported because they received more than 20 shocks. When we sought ethical approval for the study we had to specify how many shocks a dog might receive. We could find no prior studies that indicated how many shocks might be appropriate or defensible so we plucked a number more or less out of thin air. The process of training – as you presumably know – is a fast moving and very fluid one. Our trainers were instructed not to give more shocks than we had approval for, but, as we analyzed the videos at lower speeds after the event, it became apparent that two dogs had received more shocks than were approved. By then the study was complete. We weren’t sure how to proceed. These dogs were entirely typical of the others in their group. They yelped to the shocks; they learned very quickly and they had similar test performance and no signs of stress/distress beyond the initial yelping. One option would have been to silently drop them, but, again, we wanted our study to be more complete than those that had gone before, so we included mention that these dogs existed, but we couldn’t include their data because their experience was outside our approvals. So we ended up with the situation you see now. Perhaps this level of openness was not helpful, but it’s how we felt this kind of study should be done.

This paper came out rather quicker than I was anticipating so I see it has generated a lot of discussion without my voice in the mix. I also don’t have the bandwidth right now for back and forth with everyone who has an opinion (and no desire to engage with some of the intemperate tones out there). We are working on a major review of the ethics of dog training and I’ll be in a better position to talk about this when that is done. But, for now, a few quick points:

People have questioned my motivation to do this study. My motivation doesn’t change from study to study: I am always trying to find ways to help dogs and their people lead the best possible lives together.

In a world where the prevalence of injury in traffic accidents is estimated at over 0.4% and more than 20% of dogs hit by cars die of their injuries (Harris et al., 2018)—aside from all the other bad things that can happen to a dog who runs away besides being hit by a car—a solid recall is a life and death measure. A lot of dog trainers on social media are saying they have successful positive-reinforcement-only methods of instilling rock-solid recalls. Good for you. I’ve never shocked a dog and I don’t plan on doing so, but we need to recognized that most people do not seek professional help in training their dogs (Johnson & Wynne, 2024), and, in any case half of even the most popular dog trainers do not have any relevant qualifications (Johnson & Wynne, 2022). Consequently, meeting people where they are, finding out what methods they use, and testing the effectiveness of those methods is, I feel, an ethical obligation.

It’s wonderful to see how our study has prompted critical thinking in so many people. I think it was Nobel prize winner, Daniel Kahneman, who pointed out how nothing engages people’s critical acumen like results that they don’t agree with. I haven’t seen anyone raise a criticism of the study that we didn’t bring up ourselves, but it’s great to see people trying. (It is, however, disappointing to see so many people forcefully expressing opinions when they obviously haven’t read the study) Now please take that critical frame of mind and apply it to the studies you do like the results of. Did they assign dogs to conditions at random? Do they describe in detail the contingencies to which the dogs were exposed? I know our study is far from perfect but I think it’s as good as any prior study on this topic (it ought to be, we read all the existing studies before we started). Once you get into the nitty gritty of designing a study like this, it turns out to be much more difficult than you’d expect. I wouldn’t recommend it to the faint of heart nor to colleagues early in their career. That’s part of why I took it on. I am convinced work like this needs doing and if an old fart like me doesn’t do it, it probably won’t get done.

Give your dog a hug from me,

Clive.

Harris, G. L., Brodbelt, D., Church, D., Humm, K., McGreevy, P. D., Thomson, P. C., & O’Neill, D. (2018). Epidemiology, clinical management, and outcomes of dogs involved in road traffic accidents in the United Kingdom (2009-2014). Journal of Veterinary Emergency and Critical Care (San Antonio, Tex.: 2001), 28(2), 140–148. https://doi.org/10.1111/vec.12704
Johnson, A. C., & Wynne, C. D. L. (2022). Training Dogs with Science or with Nature? An Exploration of Trainers’ Word Use, Gender, and Certification Across Dog-Training Methods. Anthrozoös, 36(1), 35–51. https://doi.org/10.1080/08927936.2022.2062869
Johnson, A. C., & Wynne, C. D. (2024). Training Methods Used by Dog Guardians in the United States: Prevalence, Sources of Information, and Reasons for Use. Animals, 14(9), 1310.

https://www.mdpi.com/2076-2615/14/18/2632

Gula, Mesopotamian deity of healing with her dog. "We are not just any dog, we are dogs of Gula, poised to flay your face, tear your back to pieces, and lacerate your ankles." Sculptor possibly Hibbert Charles Binney R.S.B.A. (ca. 1872-1951). Photograph. Wellcome Collection.