From the source:
"The team found that some traits were more common in certain breeds. For example, compared with a random dog, German shepherds were more easily directed; beagles, not so much. And the authors’ genetic studies revealed that mixed-breed dogs with a particular ancestry were more likely to act in specific ways. Mutts with St Bernard ancestry, for instance, were more affectionate, whereas mutts descended from Chesapeake Bay retrievers had a penchant for wrecking doors."
They then go on to say that the variation is only around 9%, but it does seem to suggest the opposite than what the title claims. If you can estimate behavior of a stray based on assumed breed and be right more than wrong, it would seem that while breed does not predict entirely, it does correlate. It would be nice to see what the actual study was instead of a blurb.
Anecdotal, but I've had lots of dogs growing up. We have five right now. This does not reflect the reality I know.
Shiba inu act like cats and prefer to spend time away from their person. They frequently get kicked out of dog parks for not being friendly to other dogs. It's documented and well-studied. They're not at all like other dogs.
Corgis are protective, commandeering, and can be aggressive. They'll bully other dogs away from food. But they're incredibly loving, needy, and prone to feeling lonely. Again, it's a breed characteristic.
Australian shepherds are outgoing, cheerful, and tend to be neurotic. A corgi might be needy, but they won't ever express it like an Australian shepherd. A corgi will nudge you. An Aussie will dance on top of you and sometimes freak out.
Look at which dog breeds are most likely to attack humans. There are histograms for all this data. It correlates strongly with breed!
To be frank, this "study" is absurd & invalid, and there is 100% an association between breed and behavior (we literally breed dogs for certain behavioral traits!).
On that topic, I realize it's controversial but think pitbulls should be banned outright - they are responsible for the majority of fatal dog-related attacks and there is a wealth of evidence indicating that they are not a desirable breed.
From the study: "Owner survey responses are susceptible to rater bias, including the influence of breed stereotypes." That's all I could find acknowledging that this bias exists. I'm inclined to believe they know this type of bias completely invalidates the study, which is why they didn't want to explore it further.
Imagine a dog owner saying "Strongly agree" to something like "Dog has a tendency to attack (or attempt to attack) other dogs", or "Dog behaves aggressively towards children." (I believe these were questions in the surveys given to the dog owners).
> No no, not my precious Bulldozer, he's a sweety, just gets excited sometimes. I'll only put "neither agree nor disagree", because he only tries to attack dogs who are smaller than him.
I mean, I get it, nobody wants to think ill of their beloved pet, but that's the point. A study like this needs objective measures.
To add to this here's a recent systematic review looking at rates of dog bites by and bite severity by breed. Consistently Pit-bulls and German Shepherds have higher likelihood of causing biting injury against people and have increased severity of injury [0].
Anecdotally, so far I have only seen bite injuries in the ER from Pit-bulls and German Shepherds (n < 5).
That being said, whether or not breed specific legislation works to minimize dog bites is a separate scientific question.
I agreed with you on Pits but about a year ago one came to my house, no collar or tags so I kept him while trying to find owner. Which of course I never did.
Shelter is about at capacity here and most of these kind of dogs are put down which I didn't want to see. This dog was young (maybe 3) and friendly. My old border collie was bored and lonely and was very happy to have another dog. They get along great. Old border collie is the brains of the operation and Pit goes along.
So... now I'm a proud pitbull owner. Well, not proud, but an owner at least. It's maybe not as embarrassing as having a toy poodle, but going out for walks with a mean looking ghetto dog isn't something I aspired to and it's not what I would have chosen.
I took him to dog training because I was nervous about the breed. It's taught by a former police officer who specializes in handling dogs and is really great and I've learned a lot. We are now in the second advanced class and he's been doing well. I spend an hour a week in class with him and every week or so a "Pack Walk" on Saturday led by the instructor with a bunch of other dogs and people.
I know the breed is responsible for a lot of attacks (and deaths) so I don't disagree with your assessment and I felt exactly the same way but now I feel differently. According to the instructor the breed is not inherently dangerous if raised correctly but I feel extra precaution is warranted.
I live way outside town, very rural and have no neighbors so am in somewhat of a unique position to have a dog like this, I'm not sure I would have kept him if I lived close to other people. But so far no issues. He's very happy to have a home, gets along fantastic with my other dog and is pretty well trained at this point and he loves me more then my mom I think. Knock on wood he stays that way and honestly I don't mind a scary powerful dog watching the house but I am keeping a close eye on him for signs of aggression or violence. Which he has yet to exhibit so far.
The instructor says often: "We don't have a dog problem, we have a people problem".
Although pits were bred to be a fighting dog I wonder how much bad behavior can be attributed to the breed, and how much to the type of people that usually own and raise that breed.
Indeed, there are intuitive or instinctual behaviours different breeds have - of course they can learn other behaviours from observing other dogs, and training can reduce or suppress instincts to some degree as well. Context matters too, so if the environment doesn't match what their instincts would lead them to do don't have the opportunity to get triggered then you're not going to see them, at least not as often or as strongly.
The most obvious to me are the breeds that were bred for herding, and where you see that behaviour in mixes of that breed as well - even if it's muted some.
And I tend towards agreeing with you re: pitbulls. I've seen perfectly friendly and generally very gentle pitbulls snap - there's no reason for this amongst the general population.
If you want to ban pitbulls, look at the others in the study about risk rates by breed. If you ban pitbulls they'll likely be replaced by some of these and they would need to be banned as well. Of course, in the name of the environment we could ban dog ownership altogether making this a moot discussion, right?
"Number of different breeds with similar risk rates for dog bite-related fatalities (DBRFs) including: Malamutes, Chow Chows, Saint Bernards, Huskies, Great Danes, Rottweilers, Doberman Pinschers, Mastiffs, Pitbull-Type dogs, Akitas, German Shepherds, and Bulldogs."
Completely agree. Unfortunately a ban unless strictly enforced doesn't lead to much - in the UK all pit bulls are banned except for staffordshires(which imo should be banned too), and you still see owners walking their bullies and american pitbulls down the street as if it was nothing, sometimes witnout a leash even.
For hundreds of years folks breed dogs for various traits. Labs are friendly (and not great guard dogs). Greyhounds can run fast and like to chase. Pitbulls can use their strong bite and a shake behavior to devastating effect. And the list goes on.
Now we have nature coming out with a study that shows breed does NOT predict behavior?
What's interesting is I'm not sure some breeds can even mechanically behave in certain ways. Can miniature poodles even hamstring you if they wanted to?
Science has taken a lot of hits recently with some of the covid stuff. This type of scientific conclusion is going to risk some more damage to folks faith in science (or at least in the accuracy of reporting on science).
I suspect part of it is a fear of the following slippery slope:
admitting of genetic differences between breads -> genetic differences between races -> providing scientific proof that some races are better than others -> therefor some races should be treated better/worse than others.
I personally find this line of argument flawed. Putting aside any discussion of the idea of race, it simply does not follow that a) one group being better at certain things means they are inherently better overall. Or that b) being better at certain things, or even overall, means that others must be treated worse.
What you describe goes against the narrative that any living thing in a species is just as X, Y, and Z as any other living thing in that species. It's part of the "equality of outcome" push because it denies the presence of innate advantages and characteristics, which is critical to enforcing the idea that everyone has precisely the same aptitudes.
The editors at Nature are brilliant in publishing a study like this, no matter how flawed it is, because it's such a sensitive topic for dog owners and people who see patterns in dogs mauling people. It's guaranteed clicks, reposts, retweets, and angry discussion along the lines of "see, science SAYS!" and "the study is flawed."
They aren't saying that there's no physical differences in dogs' capabilities.
Pits can bite and shake because they have ridiculous jaws and a powerful build. If a miniature poodle tried, it wouldn't have much effect.
The reporting on this is also sketchier than the science; the honest headline "Study of pet dogs shows breed is imperfectly predictive of behavior", which could be confirmed by anyone with multiple dogs of a certain breed.
The study gives 9% predictive, which (if interpreted as the chance that a dog of $breed has $(breed-specific behavior)) doesn't seem too far off base (netted over a wide range of breed-specific behaviors).
Isn't this study flawed because they asked people to report on their dog's behavior? When I talk to other dog owners, they discuss the dog with respect to their perceived breed standard, "Oh, Kelly is much more calm than I expected from a Rotty" or "Joy is pretty dumb for a Collie." If they somehow got neutral observers that would be much more persuasive, in my mind.
It isn't flawed, it's straight up garbage. The fact that the authors are preferring twitter to have a conversation about the study is pretty telling as well.
No idea how they got into Nature, I thought it was supposed to be a respectable journal?
The Siberian silver fox study makes it very difficult to avoid the conclusion that behavior (e.g. tameness) in canines is a heritable trait that can be selected for.
Beginning in 1952 wild silver foxes have been bred in Siberia selecting solely for friendliness. Notable changes were found after 6 generations. By the 30th generation, 70-80% of the selected population were "domesticated elite", which "are eager to establish human contact, whimpering to attract attention and sniffing and licking experimenters like dogs."
Similar experiments were performed in the opposite direction, selecting for aggression.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domesticated_silver_fox
This is one of those studies where the conclusion is so obviously wrong that I don't even want to open it, and it makes me discount the credibility of Nature overall.
Trusting your gut over a paper published in Nature. Bold move!
Some people would use this as a moment to question what they know about dog breeds, but you choose to double down on your beliefs. Very human of you! [0][1][2][3]
There's a subreddit that campaigns on the issue. The research page has a link to lots of studies, most from respectable publications, which are really damning: https://old.reddit.com/r/BanPitBulls/wiki/research
It would contradict the headline as written, but headline is not actually an accurate statement of the article itself.
This headline, to a superficial reading, says "breed has NO predictive power with regards to behavior". What the study found was that breed is a weak predictor of behavior, not that it has no impact at all.
Followed (not too closely) by Shih Tzu and Chihuahua which are...a little less life threatening. This is just raw data and obviously not controlling for population.
This is obvious nonsense to anyone that breeds, owns or even regularly interacts with dogs. But gas lighting has always been a preferred tactic of those proselytizing "the message".
Any problems with the study? Control group is "random distribution of dogs" and the other group is "18,000 but of a no specific breed". Is that a problem or does it even out.
this is political dogma. there is a strain of dogma asserting that behavior is 100% nurture. if they accept the idea that breeds of dog have certain traits then they would be forced to reconcile with the hypothetical concept that different races of humans have different inherent behaviors or ways of thinking. people complain about science being under threat but i never see people talk about this particular dogmatic landmine that threatens to destroy any scientist who dares to approach that region of genetics. the fact of the matter is that you can never create a complete and perfect atlas of the human brain or genetics without touching this topic -- as a person who suffers from diseases that are tangential to these areas i would very much appreciate less dogma and more progress...
Yep. It's stifling fore sure. Even the guy who discovered DNA (Watson?) got some awards retracted because of saying that. You definately can't trust any research showing that behavior is not heritable or that there are no cognitive differences between races.
One study even found clear differences between races but then wrote a conclusion saying the opposite! They justified that by discovering another variable they'd forgotten to control for that they guessed might have been responsible for the difference instead of race.
This is obviously wrong to anyone who has observed dogs. Some breeds are much more vocal. My boxer would only bark to communicate (she’d bark once to be let in. Only ever twice if she didn’t hear you getting up). I’ve never seen anyone else’s boxer bark.
Some breeds are hugely vocal. Hounds for example because sounding is beneficial for hunting.
We literally breed dogs for certain behaviors. You can see a sheep dog’s instinctive herding behavior. You can watch a bird dog breed point having never seen the behavior before.
Goldens are absurd key attention seeking.
Chows very territorial.
You can literally see these things with your own eyes.
Science means looking at the evidence. The evidence is all around us.
Sometimes science shows us bias and misconception. This time I beg to differ.
I have not had the time to read the paper and see how the authors address this, but the biggest flaw of this study is relying on subjective reports by the owners. Almost all dog owners I know are used to playing down the severity of their dog's aggressiveness.
I’m curious how the method of collecting data is biased away from dogs who are less likely to be talked/bragged about by their owners. Also, that suggests it is likely more likely to represent a person’s/family’s _current_ dog and to ignore previous dogs. Dogs which are given back, thrown away, currently homeless, in a rescue organization, or were put down are likely to not be represented in this survey. Those are likely to have less breed-predictable temperaments, so I would assume the results here are a ceiling, not necessarily accurate.
That's like the whole point of breeding. For instance breeding against pit bulls who attacked their master, that's a behavior, I guess they wasted time and dogs culling those dogs instead of breeding them.
So I guess kids who want a specific dog type should just go by weight? Hey Timmy how much dog biomass you want for your birthday?
For study like that, its extremely important to design and evaluate the questionnaires carefully because people’s descriptions of temperament can vary significantly. Besides, like any society, dogs in a household also affect each other, thus not taking that into consideration can alter the result considerably.
[+] [-] ShockTohp|3 years ago|reply
They then go on to say that the variation is only around 9%, but it does seem to suggest the opposite than what the title claims. If you can estimate behavior of a stray based on assumed breed and be right more than wrong, it would seem that while breed does not predict entirely, it does correlate. It would be nice to see what the actual study was instead of a blurb.
[+] [-] echelon|3 years ago|reply
Anecdotal, but I've had lots of dogs growing up. We have five right now. This does not reflect the reality I know.
Shiba inu act like cats and prefer to spend time away from their person. They frequently get kicked out of dog parks for not being friendly to other dogs. It's documented and well-studied. They're not at all like other dogs.
Corgis are protective, commandeering, and can be aggressive. They'll bully other dogs away from food. But they're incredibly loving, needy, and prone to feeling lonely. Again, it's a breed characteristic.
Australian shepherds are outgoing, cheerful, and tend to be neurotic. A corgi might be needy, but they won't ever express it like an Australian shepherd. A corgi will nudge you. An Aussie will dance on top of you and sometimes freak out.
Look at which dog breeds are most likely to attack humans. There are histograms for all this data. It correlates strongly with breed!
[+] [-] daniel-cussen|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tkahnoski|3 years ago|reply
https://twitter.com/eenork/status/1520450288095797251
[+] [-] unknown|3 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] synaesthesisx|3 years ago|reply
On that topic, I realize it's controversial but think pitbulls should be banned outright - they are responsible for the majority of fatal dog-related attacks and there is a wealth of evidence indicating that they are not a desirable breed.
https://www.reddit.com/r/BanPitBulls/
[+] [-] srveale|3 years ago|reply
Imagine a dog owner saying "Strongly agree" to something like "Dog has a tendency to attack (or attempt to attack) other dogs", or "Dog behaves aggressively towards children." (I believe these were questions in the surveys given to the dog owners).
> No no, not my precious Bulldozer, he's a sweety, just gets excited sometimes. I'll only put "neither agree nor disagree", because he only tries to attack dogs who are smaller than him.
I mean, I get it, nobody wants to think ill of their beloved pet, but that's the point. A study like this needs objective measures.
[+] [-] sarpeedo|3 years ago|reply
Anecdotally, so far I have only seen bite injuries in the ER from Pit-bulls and German Shepherds (n < 5).
That being said, whether or not breed specific legislation works to minimize dog bites is a separate scientific question.
[0] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30579079/
[+] [-] mythrwy|3 years ago|reply
Shelter is about at capacity here and most of these kind of dogs are put down which I didn't want to see. This dog was young (maybe 3) and friendly. My old border collie was bored and lonely and was very happy to have another dog. They get along great. Old border collie is the brains of the operation and Pit goes along.
So... now I'm a proud pitbull owner. Well, not proud, but an owner at least. It's maybe not as embarrassing as having a toy poodle, but going out for walks with a mean looking ghetto dog isn't something I aspired to and it's not what I would have chosen.
I took him to dog training because I was nervous about the breed. It's taught by a former police officer who specializes in handling dogs and is really great and I've learned a lot. We are now in the second advanced class and he's been doing well. I spend an hour a week in class with him and every week or so a "Pack Walk" on Saturday led by the instructor with a bunch of other dogs and people.
I know the breed is responsible for a lot of attacks (and deaths) so I don't disagree with your assessment and I felt exactly the same way but now I feel differently. According to the instructor the breed is not inherently dangerous if raised correctly but I feel extra precaution is warranted.
I live way outside town, very rural and have no neighbors so am in somewhat of a unique position to have a dog like this, I'm not sure I would have kept him if I lived close to other people. But so far no issues. He's very happy to have a home, gets along fantastic with my other dog and is pretty well trained at this point and he loves me more then my mom I think. Knock on wood he stays that way and honestly I don't mind a scary powerful dog watching the house but I am keeping a close eye on him for signs of aggression or violence. Which he has yet to exhibit so far.
The instructor says often: "We don't have a dog problem, we have a people problem".
Although pits were bred to be a fighting dog I wonder how much bad behavior can be attributed to the breed, and how much to the type of people that usually own and raise that breed.
[+] [-] loceng|3 years ago|reply
The most obvious to me are the breeds that were bred for herding, and where you see that behaviour in mixes of that breed as well - even if it's muted some.
And I tend towards agreeing with you re: pitbulls. I've seen perfectly friendly and generally very gentle pitbulls snap - there's no reason for this amongst the general population.
[+] [-] giantg2|3 years ago|reply
"Number of different breeds with similar risk rates for dog bite-related fatalities (DBRFs) including: Malamutes, Chow Chows, Saint Bernards, Huskies, Great Danes, Rottweilers, Doberman Pinschers, Mastiffs, Pitbull-Type dogs, Akitas, German Shepherds, and Bulldogs."
https://www.fataldogattacks.org/
[+] [-] 0x737368|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] scollet|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] onphonenow|3 years ago|reply
For hundreds of years folks breed dogs for various traits. Labs are friendly (and not great guard dogs). Greyhounds can run fast and like to chase. Pitbulls can use their strong bite and a shake behavior to devastating effect. And the list goes on.
Now we have nature coming out with a study that shows breed does NOT predict behavior?
What's interesting is I'm not sure some breeds can even mechanically behave in certain ways. Can miniature poodles even hamstring you if they wanted to?
Science has taken a lot of hits recently with some of the covid stuff. This type of scientific conclusion is going to risk some more damage to folks faith in science (or at least in the accuracy of reporting on science).
[+] [-] _aavaa_|3 years ago|reply
admitting of genetic differences between breads -> genetic differences between races -> providing scientific proof that some races are better than others -> therefor some races should be treated better/worse than others.
I personally find this line of argument flawed. Putting aside any discussion of the idea of race, it simply does not follow that a) one group being better at certain things means they are inherently better overall. Or that b) being better at certain things, or even overall, means that others must be treated worse.
[+] [-] daenz|3 years ago|reply
The editors at Nature are brilliant in publishing a study like this, no matter how flawed it is, because it's such a sensitive topic for dog owners and people who see patterns in dogs mauling people. It's guaranteed clicks, reposts, retweets, and angry discussion along the lines of "see, science SAYS!" and "the study is flawed."
[+] [-] InitialLastName|3 years ago|reply
Pits can bite and shake because they have ridiculous jaws and a powerful build. If a miniature poodle tried, it wouldn't have much effect.
The reporting on this is also sketchier than the science; the honest headline "Study of pet dogs shows breed is imperfectly predictive of behavior", which could be confirmed by anyone with multiple dogs of a certain breed.
The study gives 9% predictive, which (if interpreted as the chance that a dog of $breed has $(breed-specific behavior)) doesn't seem too far off base (netted over a wide range of breed-specific behaviors).
[+] [-] jimhefferon|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] antisthenes|3 years ago|reply
No idea how they got into Nature, I thought it was supposed to be a respectable journal?
[+] [-] tkahnoski|3 years ago|reply
My understanding is they use genomic traits across mutts to try and validate if its inheritable.
[+] [-] rcpt|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jamesash|3 years ago|reply
Beginning in 1952 wild silver foxes have been bred in Siberia selecting solely for friendliness. Notable changes were found after 6 generations. By the 30th generation, 70-80% of the selected population were "domesticated elite", which "are eager to establish human contact, whimpering to attract attention and sniffing and licking experimenters like dogs." Similar experiments were performed in the opposite direction, selecting for aggression. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domesticated_silver_fox
[+] [-] bpodgursky|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] TameAntelope|3 years ago|reply
Some people would use this as a moment to question what they know about dog breeds, but you choose to double down on your beliefs. Very human of you! [0][1][2][3]
[0] https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-pathways-experie...
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belief_perseverance
[2] http://aphilosopher.drmcl.com/2015/12/11/doubling-down/
[3] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2017/10/0...
[+] [-] lin83|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rcpt|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ryandvm|3 years ago|reply
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fatal_dog_attacks_in_t...
Funny how you never hear about a golden retriever mauling anybody...
[+] [-] pupppet|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lin83|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rcpt|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mindcrime|3 years ago|reply
This headline, to a superficial reading, says "breed has NO predictive power with regards to behavior". What the study found was that breed is a weak predictor of behavior, not that it has no impact at all.
[+] [-] rozap|3 years ago|reply
Followed (not too closely) by Shih Tzu and Chihuahua which are...a little less life threatening. This is just raw data and obviously not controlling for population.
[+] [-] TameAntelope|3 years ago|reply
Ban pitbulls and those people will teach some other breed to attack.
[+] [-] rajin444|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] zarkov99|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] 323|3 years ago|reply
https://www.science.org/doi/full/10.1126/science.abk0639
[+] [-] vmception|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pboutros|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hepinhei|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] abdel_nasser|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sacrosancty|3 years ago|reply
One study even found clear differences between races but then wrote a conclusion saying the opposite! They justified that by discovering another variable they'd forgotten to control for that they guessed might have been responsible for the difference instead of race.
[+] [-] weezin|3 years ago|reply
Unless it is sexuality, then it is 100% nature.
[+] [-] more_corn|3 years ago|reply
You can literally see these things with your own eyes. Science means looking at the evidence. The evidence is all around us.
Sometimes science shows us bias and misconception. This time I beg to differ.
[+] [-] ensan|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] thephyber|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] daniel-cussen|3 years ago|reply
So I guess kids who want a specific dog type should just go by weight? Hey Timmy how much dog biomass you want for your birthday?
[+] [-] sinuhe69|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] randomblast|3 years ago|reply
This Website: “NO! THE SCIENCE IS WRONG BECAUSE IT DISAGREES WITH MY ANECDOTAL EXPERIENCE”
[+] [-] jdalgetty|3 years ago|reply