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The present study investigates how characteristics of both the dog, Canis familiaris, and their owner\ud influence the quality of life (QoL) of the pet dog. The investigation was carried out using a multiple\ud approach: (1) three questionnaires which investigated characteristics of the dog and their owner and\ud care given to the dog, (2) simple physical examination of the dog, (3) the Strange Situation Test to\ud investigate the dog’s attachment to their owner and (4) the Lexington Attachment to Pets Scale (LAPS)\ud test.\ud A sample of 104 dog–owner dyads participated in the study. The level of care was found to be positively\ud influenced by marital status (single) and negatively by the age of the dog, length of the dog–owner\ud relationship and neutering. The best physical condition was found for pure breed dogs belonging to men and\ud to people who prefer dogs among pets while physical condition decreases for aging dogs or those with a long\ud relationship with their owner. Attachment to the owner was stronger for dogs with a long relationship and\ud those belonging to people who had had previous experience with pets and those with many emotional bonds.\ud Conversely, the attachment level was lower for pure breed dogs and those whose owners shared the property\ud with other people. LAPS was influenced only by owner features: people more attached to their dogs are\ud those who do not live with children and who do have many emotional bonds. Finally, the majority of dogs\ud had a high level of QoL which was influenced positively by the number of emotional bonds of the owner and\ud negatively by the dog’s age and length of the dog–owner relationship

Aged dogs spontaneously develop progressive decline in both cognitive and behavioral function, in addition to neuropathological changes, that collectively parallel several aspects of human aging and Alzheimer's disease progression and likely contribute to the development of canine cognitive dysfunction syndrome. In the current study, ethologically relevant spatial learning, retention, and reversal learning tasks were conducted, with the goal of expanding canine neuropsychological testing to pet dogs. Initially, dogs (N = 44, aged 7.8 ± 2.8 years, mean ± SD) had to learn which of two alternative routes successfully led out of a T-maze. Two weeks later, long-term memory retention was assessed, immediately followed by a reversal learning task in which the previously correct route out of the maze was reversed compared with the initial learning and memory retention tasks. No effects of age were evident on the learning or retention tasks. However, older (≥ 8 years) dogs were significantly impaired on the reversal learning task compared with younger ones (< 8 years). Moreover, trial response latency was significantly increased in aged dogs across both the initial and reversal learning tasks but not on the retention task, which suggests that processing speed was impaired by increasing age during the acquisition of novel spatial information but not during performance of previously learned responses. Overall, the current study provides a framework for assessing cognitive function in pet dogs, which should improve understanding of the effects of aging on cognition in the dog population.

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