Applied Animal Behaviour Science最新文献

{"title":"Recognising the facial expression of frustration in the horse during feeding period","authors":"Claire Ricci-Bonot,&nbsp;Daniel Simon Mills","doi":"10.1016/j.applanim.2023.105966","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.applanim.2023.105966","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>Horses often present negative emotional states which are frequently poorly recognised, with much of our understanding of horse expressions based on anecdotes, rather than scientific evidence. The aim of this project was to identify potential facial markers of emotional states. 31 horses, aged between 2 and 23 years old (mean ± SD: 11.5 years, ± 6.6) and various genders (1 male, 10 geldings and 20 females) took part in the study. They were tested in three different scenarios involving the potential availability of food. Horses were trained to anticipate a reward after 10 s and then tested across the following three situations. Anticipation of a reward, considered a positive emotional state; frustration at waiting for a reward and disappointment at the loss of the reward - both considered negative emotional states. Tests were conducted in a stable with a feeding device fixed outside the stable within reach of the horse. Analysis of video recordings of facial expressions of the horses was undertaken using the Horse Facial Action Coding System (EquiFACS), an objective system for coding facial movements on the basis of the contraction of underlying muscles, as well as their behaviours. Specific facial markers associated with anticipation could not be characterised, however, we found that the occurrence of 9 actions and behaviours differed significantly between the two situations predicted to induce frustration and disappointment during the feeding period. The frustration phase was characterised by a higher likelihood of ‘eye white increase’ (AD1), ‘ear rotator’ (EAD104), and ‘biting feeder’ compared to the ‘disappointment’ situations. By contrast, ‘blink’ (AU145), ‘nostril lift’ (AUH13), ‘tongue show’ (AD19), ‘chewing’ (AD81) and ‘licking feeder’ were more likely in the ‘disappointment’ phase than in the ‘frustration’ situation. There was also a general gender effect with females more likely to blink than males. The findings of this research may help differentiate frustration and disappointment at least during the feeding period.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":8222,"journal":{"name":"Applied Animal Behaviour Science","volume":"265 ","pages":"Article 105966"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2023-08-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46218788","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Associations of range use with individual behaviour, clinical welfare indicators, fear response and gastrointestinal characteristics of two laying hen hybrids","authors":"Kaitlin E. Wurtz ,&nbsp;Fernanda M. Tahamtani ,&nbsp;Leslie Foldager ,&nbsp;Karen Thodberg ,&nbsp;Anja B. Riber","doi":"10.1016/j.applanim.2023.105978","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.applanim.2023.105978","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>Access to an outdoor range provides laying hens with increased space and improved opportunities for performing natural behaviours. However, not all hens utilise the range to the same extent, and this may be associated with the welfare of the individual hen. The aim of this study was to assess if extent of range use was associated with several clinical welfare indicators, time budgets, measures of tonic immobility and gastrointestinal characteristics. One hundred twenty focal individuals (Bovans Brown, n = 60; Dekalb White, n = 60) randomly chosen from 12 pens of 100 hens (10 hens from each pen) were housed in accordance with the EU organic standards. Clinical welfare indicators including plumage condition, foot health, keel bone damage and body weight were assessed upon arrival at 18 weeks of age and again at 23, 28, 33 and 38 weeks of age. Over five three-day periods at corresponding weeks, hens received individual back marks for identification and behaviour was recorded by instantaneous scan sampling from 8:30–15:30 in the house and on the range. Behaviour recorded included comfort behaviours, drinking, dust bathing, eating, foraging, locomotion, nest use, pecking, perching, resting and standing. Frequency of passes through the pophole and duration of time outdoors were also determined through video observations. At 18 weeks of age a tonic immobility test was performed and number of inductions, latency to first head movement after induction and the duration of tonic immobility were recorded. At the end of the study (38 weeks of age), gastrointestinal tract morphology and contents were assessed. Individual range use varied, with hens differing in time spent on range, number of exits and consistency in these measures over time. Extent of range use was not associated with clinical welfare indicators nor fear levels as assessed by a tonic immobility test. Hens’ time budgets differed depending on where they spent most of their day, with hens utilising the range to a greater extent generally being more active (duration on range: foraging: P &lt; 0.001, standing: P = 0.005; number of exits: locomotion: P &lt; 0.001). Hens that utilised the range to a greater extent likely consumed more forage, as evident by the greater weight of pasture found in their crop and gizzard (P &lt; 0.001), contributing to more developed gastrointestinal organs including the crop (duration on range: P = 0.004), gizzard (P &lt; 0.001), and proventriculus (duration on range: P = 0.014). To conclude, the fear level and clinical welfare condition of the hens were not associated with extent of range use, unlike the time budgets and gastrointestinal characteristics.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":8222,"journal":{"name":"Applied Animal Behaviour Science","volume":"265 ","pages":"Article 105978"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2023-08-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44687172","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"The effect of anthropogenic noise on foraging and vigilance in zoo housed pied tamarins","authors":"Fiene Steinbrecher ,&nbsp;Jacob C. Dunn ,&nbsp;Eluned C. Price ,&nbsp;Lisa H. Buck ,&nbsp;Claudia A.F. Wascher ,&nbsp;Fay E. Clark","doi":"10.1016/j.applanim.2023.105989","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.applanim.2023.105989","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>The phenomenon of human-induced rapid environmental change (HIREC) is a great challenge in the modern world that presents a threat to all species. Research on the effect of anthropogenic noise on free-living wildlife is increasing but the effect of anthropogenic noise on the behaviour and welfare of captive wildlife has received limited attention, even though captive settings are full of human activity and a wide range of sounds. Moreover, studies in captivity tend to classify noise subjectively by volume according to human hearing and as part of the overall ‘visitor effect’ rather than a stressor in its own right. Research on free-living wildlife suggests that anthropogenic noise can negatively impact foraging behaviour; similar impacts in captive species could have a detrimental effect on their health and welfare if animals cannot perform functional feeding behaviours and access adequate nutrition. In the current study, we designed a forage box experiment for captive pied tamarins, a Critically Endangered callitrichid primate species that is prone to poor physical health and breeding success in captivity. Ten pairs of tamarins housed at Jersey Zoo were provided with a forage box containing cryptic (hidden) prey items (waxworms). Using a within-subjects design, tamarins were provided access to the forage box in noise and non-noise conditions of anthropogenic noise (machinery used for gardening in the zoo). Both active (foraging with the hands) and observational (looking into the forage box) foraging were significantly less frequent in the presence of anthropogenic noise; however, there was no difference in the duration of these behaviours or in foraging success. Furthermore, the presence of anthropogenic noise did not significantly affect vigilance behaviour. We found no sex differences in the effect of noise, and our results suggest that the anthropogenic noise we tested was only a minimal distractor for tamarins. However, large individual differences in foraging suggest that other factors may have a larger impact on foraging than the anthropogenic noise used in this experiment. More research into how captive animals may respond to the presence of anthropogenic noise is needed.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":8222,"journal":{"name":"Applied Animal Behaviour Science","volume":"265 ","pages":"Article 105989"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2023-08-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45951639","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Reducing barking in a Brazilian animal shelter: A practical intervention","authors":"Ana Lucia Baldan ,&nbsp;Bruna Lima Ferreira ,&nbsp;Vinicius Warisaia ,&nbsp;Erica Nan Feuerbacher ,&nbsp;Patrícia Ferreira Monticelli ,&nbsp;Lisa Marie Gunter","doi":"10.1016/j.applanim.2023.105992","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.applanim.2023.105992","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>Barking is a common problem in animal shelters. Loud noise is an irritant and stressful to both humans and other animals. In the present study, we tested a positive reinforcement intervention using food delivery with 70 dogs at a municipal animal shelter in Pirassununga, state of São Paulo, Brazil. The experiment consisted of three conditions with three daily phases: pre-intervention (A1), intervention (B), and post-intervention (A2). The intervention consisted of the experimenter (ALB) entering the building in which dogs were housed, stopping at each of its 12 kennels (between 4 and 6 dogs in each kennel), and delivering food to the dogs after they had ceased barking. After the first study condition with its single experimenter, we conducted two other conditions to test the generalization of the intervention with novel stimuli. In Condition 2, the experimenter was accompanied by a student; and in Condition 3, the experimenter was with the same student and a shelter employee. Continuous sound levels (Leq dB) and duration of barking were measured pre- and post-intervention throughout the study’s three conditions as well as the amount of time needed to carry out the intervention each day. We found that, on average, both Leq dB and barking duration reduced following the intervention with a decrease in both measures from the beginning to the end of the study. Furthermore, intervention implementation time shortened across the study’s conditions, with less than three minutes needed for the intervention to be carried out in Condition 3. In total, our findings suggest that the Barking Reduction Protocol (BRP) is an effective, low-effort intervention that reduces dog barking in the animal shelter. When considering the many issues that compromise the daily lives of shelter dogs, this intervention may be a useful tool in changing dogs’ barking behavior in response to people and improve their welfare as they await adoption.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":8222,"journal":{"name":"Applied Animal Behaviour Science","volume":"265 ","pages":"Article 105992"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2023-08-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44362042","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Monkeying around: Non-human primate behavioural responses to humans reproducing their facial expressions","authors":"Béatrice Luisi ,&nbsp;Jérôme Micheletta ,&nbsp;Eglantine Julle-Danière ,&nbsp;Jérôme Catinaud ,&nbsp;Laëtitia Maréchal","doi":"10.1016/j.applanim.2023.105990","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.applanim.2023.105990","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>People are often observed mimicking animals’ facial expressions in an attempt to communicate with them. However, to date, there is limited understanding of how animals respond to humans reproducing their facial displays, or if this type of human behaviour presents a risk for either human safety or animal welfare. In the present study, we investigated how Barbary macaques (<em>Macaca sylvanus</em>) responded to pictures of humans and conspecifics displaying their facial expressions. Macaques viewed pictures of neutral, mildly threatening or highly threatening human or macaque faces. We recorded aggressive, submissive, and self-directed behaviours exhibited by individuals while in front of each stimulus. Macaques displayed more self-scratching toward human neutral face compared to the corresponding macaque face, and vice versa for the mild threat. They also exhibited more aggressive behaviours toward macaque neutral and mildly threatening stimuli compared to the human stimuli. However, macaques did not display any more submissive behaviour between human and macaque for any facial stimuli. There was also no significant difference in behavioural responses for highly threatening faces between species. These findings suggest that while the reproduced facial expression by humans might carry meaning for macaques, their responses vary between species. Therefore, these results highlight some potential issues for facial signalling (mis)communication between species, which has implications for animal welfare and human safety.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":8222,"journal":{"name":"Applied Animal Behaviour Science","volume":"265 ","pages":"Article 105990"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2023-08-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42856698","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Welfare impacts associated with using aversive geofencing devices on captive Asian elephants","authors":"Surendranie J. Cabral de Mel ,&nbsp;Saman Seneweera ,&nbsp;Ruvinda K. de Mel ,&nbsp;Ashoka Dangolla ,&nbsp;Devaka K. Weerakoon ,&nbsp;Tek Maraseni ,&nbsp;Benjamin L. Allen","doi":"10.1016/j.applanim.2023.105991","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.applanim.2023.105991","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>Animal-borne aversive geofencing devices (AGDs, or satellite-linked shock collars) are commercially available and used on livestock to restrict their movement within a virtual boundary. This technology has potential application as a human-wildlife conflict mitigation tool, where problem animals might be conditioned to avoid human-dominated habitats by associating an audio warning with a subsequent electric shock, which is delivered if the audio warning is ignored. Ensuring that high standards of animal welfare are maintained when implementing such tools is important for acquiring manager and community acceptance of such approaches. We conducted two pilot experiments with eight captive Asian elephants using mild electric shocks from a modified dog-training collar fitted around the neck, as part of an ongoing effort to develop AGDs suitable for mitigating human-elephant conflict. As part of these experiments, we assessed elephants' behavioural and physiological stress before, during and after the experiments. During the experiments elephants wore collars for up to nine consecutive days and received a small number of electric shocks on 1–3 consecutive days. Bootstrapped principal component analysis showed that daily activity budgets of individual elephants on experiment days were not different from the pre-experiment days. Generalised linear mixed-effects model (GLMM) showed that anxiety/stress behaviours increased on the first day of acclimatising to the collar and on testing days (i.e. days they received shocks) of the first experiment, but not during the second experiment relative to pre-experiment days. Analysis of faecal cortisol metabolite (FCM) concentrations using GLMM showed that FCM concentrations were higher in samples collected ∼24 hrs and ∼48 hrs after testing days compared to baseline levels as expected given the lag time for excretion of cortisol metabolites. These elevated anxiety/stress behaviours and FCM concentrations returned to baseline levels shortly after the experiment. Therefore, we conclude that AGDs did not produce lasting behavioural or physiological stress effects in elephants during this short-term study but recommend further studies with a larger sample of elephants to confirm the transferability of these findings.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":8222,"journal":{"name":"Applied Animal Behaviour Science","volume":"265 ","pages":"Article 105991"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2023-08-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44245366","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Tit alarm calls trigger anti-predator behavior in free-range domestic chickens","authors":"Li Zhang ,&nbsp;Jinmei Liu ,&nbsp;Zihui Zhang ,&nbsp;Wei Liang","doi":"10.1016/j.applanim.2023.106009","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.applanim.2023.106009","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>Interspecific call transmission is a common information-gathering behavior in birds. Unlike centralized large-scale chicken farming in urban areas, domestic chickens (<span><em>Gallus </em><em>gallus domesticus</em></span>) in remote mountainous areas of China are often raised free-range by individual households. Free-range domestic chickens are exposed to many natural predators and can increase their chances of survival if they can respond to heterospecific alarm signals. To this end, we observed free-ranging domestic chickens in Miao village communities around Leishan County, Guizhou, southwestern China, and we performed comparisons on the behavioral responses of these chickens to the territorial song and alarm calls of wild Japanese tits (<span><em>Parus</em><em> minor</em></span>). Our findings showed that the chickens were more vigilant to Japanese tit alarm calls than to territorial songs and exhibited significant anti-predator behaviors such as vigilance and runaway. Furthermore, there was significant difference in behavioral response to the two different alarm calls, with greater vigilance to tit alarm calls for Siberian chipmunks (<span><em>Tamias</em><em> sibiricus</em></span><span>) than for sparrowhawks (</span><span><em>Accipiter</em><em> nisus</em></span>). This suggests that domestic chickens can differentiate between territorial songs and alarm calls of wild Japanese tits, and there is a behavioral difference in the two types of alarm calls of Japanese tits.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":8222,"journal":{"name":"Applied Animal Behaviour Science","volume":"265 ","pages":"Article 106009"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2023-08-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47389223","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Evaluating blood, gill, and muscle biopsy methods on the behaviour, reproductive success, and survival of a wild freshwater fish","authors":"Laura S.E. Haniford ,&nbsp;Luc LaRochelle,&nbsp;Jessica A. Robichaud,&nbsp;Declan Burton,&nbsp;Steven J. Cooke","doi":"10.1016/j.applanim.2023.106004","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.applanim.2023.106004","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>Non-lethal biopsy methods (including blood, gill, and muscle biopsies) have been used to study the health and physiological status of wild fishes. Nonetheless, concerns exist regarding the impact of non-lethal sampling on relevant welfare measures such as behaviour and survival. Here, nesting Smallmouth Bass (<span><em>Micropterus dolomieu</em></span>) were used as a model species to study in situ how fish respond to non-lethal sampling. Male Smallmouth Bass provide sole parental care and guard well-defined nests for a period of several weeks, providing a unique opportunity to assess behaviour, reproductive success, and survival in the wild. Fish were captured from their nests by angling and subjected to a biopsy (either blood, gill, or muscle), or a combination of all three biopsy methods prior to release. A control group that was captured but not biopsied as well as a non-angled control were also included. Nests were monitored for a period of four weeks or until the parental males either abandoned offspring, died, or raised a brood to independence. Single biopsies, regardless of the biopsy type, were found to have no impact on parental care and survival, but fish that received the combined treatment took longer to return to their nest and displayed a 6.5 times greater likelihood of nest abandonment. Mortality was only observed in fish that received the combined biopsy treatment. As such, this study reveals that it is possible to maintain the welfare status of Smallmouth Bass in the wild by using individual biopsies, thus emphasizing the importance of making careful decisions about which tissues are needed to achieve desired study objectives. This is one of the few studies to assess the behavioural and fitness consequences of increasingly common non-lethal biopsy methods and provides useful information on the relative consequences of different biopsy methods on wild fish.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":8222,"journal":{"name":"Applied Animal Behaviour Science","volume":"265 ","pages":"Article 106004"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2023-08-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48495854","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"The quest to develop automated systems for monitoring animal behavior","authors":"Janice M. Siegford ,&nbsp;Juan P. Steibel ,&nbsp;Junjie Han ,&nbsp;Madonna Benjamin ,&nbsp;Tami Brown-Brandl ,&nbsp;Joao R.R. Dórea ,&nbsp;Daniel Morris ,&nbsp;Tomas Norton ,&nbsp;Eric Psota ,&nbsp;Guilherme J.M. Rosa","doi":"10.1016/j.applanim.2023.106000","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.applanim.2023.106000","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>Automated behavior analysis (ABA) strategies are being researched at a rapid rate to detect an array of behaviors across a range of species. There is growing optimism that soon ethologists will not have to manually decode hours (and hours) of animal behavior videos, but that instead computers will process them for us. However, before we assume ABA is ready for practical use, it is important to take a realistic look at exactly what ABA is being developed, the expertise being used to develop it, and the context in which these studies occur. Once we understand common pitfalls occurring during ABA development and identify limitations, we can construct robust ABA tools to achieve automated (ultimately even continuous and real time) analysis of behavioral data, allowing for more detailed or longer-term studies of behavior on larger numbers of animals than ever before. ABA is only as good as it is trained to be. A key starting point is having manually annotated data for model training and assessment. However, most ABA developers are not trained in ethology. Often no formal ethogram is developed and descriptions of target behaviors in ABA publications are limited or inaccurate. In addition, ABA is also frequently developed using small datasets, which lack sufficient variability in animal morphometrics, activities, camera viewpoints, and environmental features to be generalizable. Thus, ABA often needs to be further validated before being used satisfactorily on different populations or under other conditions, even for research purposes. Multidisciplinary teams of researchers including ethologists and ethicists as well as computer scientists, data scientists, and engineers are needed to help address problems when applying computer vision ABA to measure behavior. Reference datasets that can be used for behavior detection should be generated and shared that include image data, annotations, and baseline analyses for benchmarking. Also critical is the development of standards for creating such reference datasets and descriptions of best practices for methods for validating results from detection tools to ensure they are robust and generalizable. At present, only a handful of publicly available datasets exist that can be used for development of ABA tools. As we work to realize the promise of ABA (and subsequent precision livestock farming technologies) to detect animal behavior, a clear understanding of best practices, access to accurately annotated datasets, and networking among ethologists and ABA developers will increase our chances for rapid and robust successes.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":8222,"journal":{"name":"Applied Animal Behaviour Science","volume":"265 ","pages":"Article 106000"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2023-08-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42163872","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"What caregivers don’t tell you ... A comparison between survey responses and home videos of cat-cat interactions","authors":"Morgane J.R. Van Belle ,&nbsp;Noema Gajdoš Kmecová ,&nbsp;Frank A.M. Tuyttens ,&nbsp;Christel P.H. Moons ,&nbsp;Daniel S. Mills ,&nbsp;Tiny C.B.M. De Keuster","doi":"10.1016/j.applanim.2023.105993","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.applanim.2023.105993","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>Domestic cats<span> are increasingly popular as companion animals, but behavioural problems are often reported, especially in multicat households. Social tension is a common stressor, so understanding intercat interactions and their dynamics is crucial. Nevertheless, direct research in the home setting is rare. As caregivers witness their cats’ behaviour on a daily basis, they are a potentially important source of information, but might be unreliable and subject to bias. This study examined the reliability of caregiver reporting by comparing survey answers with behaviours observed in home videos collected after the survey was completed. The occurrence of five cat-cat interactions (head rubbing, allogrooming, sleeping in physical contact with each other, tail up greetings and social play) was examined in 42 two-cat households using 210 survey answers and 775 videos. The percentage of false negative survey responses for behaviours observed in the videos was conservatively estimated (cFN) at 8%, with 22.9% of the negative answers being falsely negative (FOR – False Omission Rate) and 77.1% truly negative (NPV – Negative Predictive Value). Broad false negatives (bFN), which included uncertain responses as negative reports, were 9.5% of the survey responses with a FOR of 75% and NPV of 25% in this context. Highest values were obtained for head rubbing (cFN: 10.5%, bFN: 14.3%) and allogrooming (cFN: 9.8%; bFN: 11.9%). When focusing on individual cat caregivers, 14 out of 42 caregivers (33.3%) failed to reliably report the occurrence of at least one of the surveyed cat-cat interactions. For interactions that were seen on camera, 23.8% of caregivers (10/42) responded that their cats did not show these interactions and 9.5% (4/42) reported uncertainty about whether it ever occurred. These results should be considered a lower estimate of the magnitude of errors (false negatives) in caregiver reports, and their implications need to be considered in both research that depends on caregiver report, and clinical assessments within behavioural medicine. Many cat-cat interactions, and in particular head rubbing and allogrooming, will be underreported when relying exclusively on caregiver reporting.</span></p></div>","PeriodicalId":8222,"journal":{"name":"Applied Animal Behaviour Science","volume":"265 ","pages":"Article 105993"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2023-08-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42586005","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}