A Preliminary Study toward a Rapid Assessment of Age-Related Behavioral Differences in Family Dogs

Abstract

Over the last few years, several efforts have been undertaken to characterize the aging process in dogs. In the present study, we evaluate a short protocol measuring dogs’ cognitive, social, and physical capacities. Our aim was to develop a feasible test battery, with minimal pre-training requirements, no complex devices, and which is set outdoors (i.e., a specific testing room is not needed). As ageing in dogs is usually associated with a decrease in activity, we also assessed the personality trait activity/excitability with a dog personality questionnaire. Four subtests proved sensitive to the dogs’ age. In particular, old dogs displayed less approaching and following behaviors toward an unknown but friendly human, showed both less avoidance and interest toward a novel object, looked less at the owner when faced with an unsolvable problem, and performed worse on the short-term memory task. Previous test procedures for investigating age-related changes involve expensive and/or complicated devices and extensive pre-training. The main advantage of the proposed battery is to reduce costs and efforts in veterinary assessments. Further tests in same-breed, large samples and between dogs with mild and severe cognitive impairments will be needed in order to further validate the battery.

Developmental features of sleep electrophysiology in family dogs

“…Beyond these studies, the majority of the literature examining age-related changes in dog behaviour (e.g. 45 ), cognition (e.g. 46 ), brain anatomy (e.g., 47 ) or neural processes (e.g., 7 ), consists of studies with ‘adult’, i.e., 12-month-old or older animals or declare that dogs older than 12 months of age are adults (e.g.…”

Gut Microbiome Composition is Associated with Age and Memory Performance in Pet Dogs

“…The wide range of expected lifespans, a natural risk to develop dementia, and an environment shared with humans, has also made dogs a promising model organism in aging research (for a review see [10]). Since laboratory dogs represent a limited sample of the natural genetic and environmental variability found in human populations and companion (or pet) dogs, the latter has gained more popularity in aging research recently [11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18]. Their behavior also differs from that of laboratory dogs [19] in ways that make the companion dog a more ecologically valid model of human aging.…”

Two valid and reliable tests for monitoring age-related memory performance and neophobia differences in dogs

“…Consequently, behavioural and physical deficits in old age have become more prevalent. In the last decades, research on canine ageing has grown exponentially as both scientists and the public have increasingly recognised dogs’ emotional, economic, and scientific value as an animal model species 2 – 5 . Studies have shown that owners of ageing pet dogs often report a decline in the dogs’ visual and auditory function, changes in social behaviour 6 – 12 , and the sleep/wake cycle 13 , 14 .…”

“…Recently a battery of standardised outdoor behavioural tests (Mini Mental Test, MMT) was developed to allow the rapid assessment of age-related behavioural differences in family dogs 2 . Older dogs displayed less social interest, poorer spatial memory, and seemed less interested in and less fearful of a novel, moving object 2 .…”

“…Recently a battery of standardised outdoor behavioural tests (Mini Mental Test, MMT) was developed to allow the rapid assessment of age-related behavioural differences in family dogs 2 . Older dogs displayed less social interest, poorer spatial memory, and seemed less interested in and less fearful of a novel, moving object 2 . However, neither test–retest nor interobserver reliabilities were reported for this test battery which are necessary before applying the tests to clinical settings.…”