The Ideal Canine Companion: Re-Exploring Australian Perspectives on Ideal Characteristics for Companion Dogs.

Defining the ideal characteristics of canine companions is imperative to those seeking to improve human-dog relationships. Previous investigations into the preferred traits of companion dogs were conducted before substantial recent events, such as the rise of social media and the COVID-19 pandemic, which altered human lifestyles and potentially affected canine preferences and owner satisfaction. This study surveyed Australian adults ( = 337) online to assess these shifts.

Application of an Adapted Behaviour Change Wheel to Assistance Dog Puppy Raising: A Proposed Raiser-Centred Support Program.

Puppy raising (PR) programs recruit volunteer community members (raisers) to raise assistance dog (AD) candidates from puppyhood until the dogs are ready for advanced training. Once qualified, ADs assist human handlers with a disability to live more independently. Unfortunately, about 50% of all puppies do not meet the behavioural standards required for further training after completing a PR program.

Executive functions and household chores: Does engagement in chores predict children's cognition?

Introduction: The benefits of completing household chores appear to transfer beyond managing day-to-day living. It is possible that chore engagement may improve executive functions, as engagement in chores require individuals to plan, self-regulate, switch between tasks, and remember instructions. To date, little research has been conducted on household chores and executive functions in children, for whom these skills are still developing.

Diving in Nose First: The Influence of Unfamiliar Search Scale and Environmental Context on the Search Performance of Volunteer Conservation Detection Dog-Handler Teams.

Conservation detection dogs (CDDs) are trained to locate biological material from plants and animals of interest to conservation efforts and are often more effective and economical than other detection methods. However, the financial costs of developing and appropriately caring for CDDs can nonetheless prohibit their use, particularly by smaller conservation organizations. Training skilled volunteers to work with suitable pet dogs may help address this constraint.

Self-reported snake management practices among owners in Victoria, Australia.

Background: A large number of snakes are kept as pets in Western societies. Few studies have been undertaken to assess keeping practices of snakes by private owners in Australia. Therefore, there is concern that some owners may not understand even basic husbandry requirements.

The influence of contextual factors on an individual's ability to work with an assistance dog.

Purpose: First-time assistance dog handlers experience a profound life change when they bring an assistance dog into their home. Therefore, this article investigates the broad context of handlers' lived experiences prior to and throughout the first year after acquiring an assistance dog.

Materials And Methods: To understand holistic experiences better, semi-structured interviews were conducted with first-time assistance dog handlers ( = 7), parents ( = 7), assistance dog instructors ( = 6), carers/other individuals ( = 3) at four time points: before an individual received an assistance dog, and then at three further times for up to one year after they received the assistance dog.

Raising an Assistance Dog Puppy-Stakeholder Perspectives on What Helps and What Hinders.

Assistance dog puppies live with their raisers for up to 16 months before entering advanced training and, hopefully, becoming qualified to help people with a disability. Almost half of the puppies fail to meet the behavioural standards required for assistance dogs, and some puppy raisers produce more behaviourally favourable puppies than others. It is unclear what factors influence puppy-raising practice quality.

Perceptions of Responsible Cat Ownership Behaviors among a Convenience Sample of Australians.

Responsible cat ownership is important for keeping pet cats and wildlife safe. Much research investigating levels of compliance with and attitudes towards responsible cat ownership practices has focused on cat owners. Non-owner attitudes are relevant because their opinions may encourage cat-owning friends and family to engage (or not) in a cat management practice.

Illusory contour perception in domestic dogs.

One way to better understand how animals visually perceive their environment is to assess the way in which visual information is interpreted and adapted based on preconceptions. Domestic dogs represent a unique species in which to evaluate visual perception as recent findings suggest they may differ from humans and other animal species in terms of their susceptibility to geometric visual illusions. Dogs have demonstrated human-like, reversed, and null susceptibility depending on the type of illusion.

Throwing the Baby Out With the Bath Water: Could Widespread Neutering of Companion Dogs Cause Problems at a Population Level?

In many countries where companion dogs are popular, owners are strongly encouraged to neuter their dogs. Consequently, millions of dogs are neutered each year. In recent times considerable attention has been paid to the possible effects of such procedures on canine health and welfare.

What do dogs (Canis familiaris) see? A review of vision in dogs and implications for cognition research.

Over the last 20 years, a large amount of research has been conducted in an attempt to uncover the cognitive abilities of the domestic dog. While substantial advancements have been made, progress has been impeded by the fact that little is known about how dogs visually perceive their external environment. It is imperative that future research determines more precisely canine visual processing capabilities, particularly considering the increasing number of studies assessing cognition via paradigms requiring vision.

Relational concept learning in domestic dogs: Performance on a two-choice size discrimination task generalises to novel stimuli.

One central issue in the study of animal cognition concerns conceptual behaviour, where an organism categorises objects, events, and relationships so as to transfer previously learned rules to novel contexts. In this study, we investigated whether or not dogs demonstrate conceptual behaviour in the form of simple relational class concept learning. A two-choice visual discrimination task was used to assess if dogs are capable of simple relational class concept learning by generalising the same rule (i.

Development of the cat-owner relationship scale (CORS).

Characteristics of the human-animal bond can be influenced by both owner-related and pet-related factors, which likely differ between species. Three studies adapted the Monash Dog-Owner Relationship Scale (MDORS) to permit assessment of human-cat interactions as perceived by the cat's owner. In Study 1293 female cat owners completed a modified version of the MDORS, where 'dog' was replaced with 'cat' for all items.

Assessment of domestic cat personality, as perceived by 416 owners, suggests six dimensions.

Understanding individual behavioral differences in domestic cats could lead to improved selection when potential cat owners choose a pet with whom to share their lives, along with consequent improvements in cat welfare. Yet very few attempts have been made to elicit cat personality dimensions using the trait-based exploratory approaches applied previously, with some success, to humans and dogs. In this study, a list of over 200 adjectives used to describe cat personality was assembled.

Visual perception in domestic dogs: susceptibility to the Ebbinghaus-Titchener and Delboeuf illusions.

Susceptibility to geometrical visual illusions has been tested in a number of non-human animal species, providing important information about how these species perceive their environment. Considering their active role in human lives, visual illusion susceptibility was tested in domestic dogs (Canis familiaris). Using a two-choice simultaneous discrimination paradigm, eight dogs were trained to indicate which of two presented circles appeared largest.

Using Scent Detection Dogs in Conservation Settings: A Review of Scientific Literature Regarding Their Selection.

Dogs are widely used for scent detection work, assisting in searches for, among other things, missing persons, explosives, and even cancers. They are also increasingly used in conservation settings, being deployed for a range of diverse purposes. Although scent detecting dogs have been used in conservation roles for over 100 years, it is only recently that the scientific literature has begun to document their effectiveness and, importantly, how suitable dogs should initially be selected by organizations wanting to develop a detection program.

Why do animals differ in their susceptibility to geometrical illusions?

In humans, geometrical illusions are thought to reflect mechanisms that are usually helpful for seeing the world in a predictable manner. These mechanisms deceive us given the right set of circumstances, correcting visual input where a correction is not necessary. Investigations of non-human animals' susceptibility to geometrical illusions have yielded contradictory results, suggesting that the underlying mechanisms with which animals see the world may differ across species.

Reasons People Surrender Unowned and Owned Cats to Australian Animal Shelters and Barriers to Assuming Ownership of Unowned Cats.

Most cats surrendered to nonhuman animal shelters are identified as unowned, and the surrender reason for these cats is usually simply recorded as "stray." A cross-sectional study was conducted with people surrendering cats to 4 Australian animal shelters. Surrenderers of unowned cats commonly gave surrender reasons relating to concern for the cat and his/her welfare.

Cross-Sectional Study of Characteristics of Owners and Nonowners Surrendering Cats to Four Australian Animal Shelters.

Unwanted cats surrendered to nonhuman animal shelters are generally categorized as either "owned" or "stray." This classification is misleading because "stray" cats may include many "semiowned" cats, for which people provide care but who are not perceived as being owned. This differentiation is important because effective strategies designed to reduce cat admissions to, and euthanasia rates in, shelters rely on accurate information about cat populations contributing to shelter intake; cat semiowners will likely respond to different strategies than people with no relationship with the cats they surrender.

Puppy parties and beyond: the role of early age socialization practices on adult dog behavior.

The most common role of a domestic dog in the developed world currently is that of companion. Puppy socialization practices play a large role in the development of well-adjusted adult dogs that display few undesirable behaviors, and which can establish a positive, lifelong relationship with their owner. Age-appropriate socialization practices should begin within a few days of birth, and should extend well into adulthood.