Canine Behavior Flashcards
Natural selection has modified behavior skills to best match the _____.
Environment
Since _____ can only change if the genotypes allow, both anatomical and behavior changes must have a genetic component.
Phenotypes
Behavior is adaptive. Behavior is aimed at the organism’s fitness. It has a _____, not a purpose, to increase chances of survival and reproduction.
Function
Genetic _____ occurs when individuals from two or more previously separated populations begin interbreeding.
Admixture
Wolves and dogs separated due to _____, mutations, and selective breeding.
Domestication
Behavior originates by _____.
Chance
If a behavior increases their fitness value in the struggle for survival, it tends to _____.
Persist
Pacifying behavior has a double function - it pacifies the opponent and also the _____.
Pacifier
_____ is a joint action between two or more individuals to achieve a common goal. It can also refer to prosocial behavior by which an animal acts to benefit another.
Cooperation
Social behavior and cooperation are necessities in some species as it increases their _____, improves survival and reproductive rates.
Fitness
_____ pair bonding. The male leads hunts at locations several kilometers away from the den where the female remains to tend to the cubs. Later on the male returns with food (pieces of prey and regurgitated food) to the den.
Monogamous
Unlike wolves, free-ranging dogs have a primarily promiscuous (many short lived mating sessions) mating system. They rarely form _____ pairs, and other than the mothers, rarely feed pups.
Monogamous
_____ behavior is all behavior that preempts mating. This is probably a function of ensuring the male is a suitable sperm donor and he is capable of taking care of offspring. This is called sexual selection.
Courtship
Females are very _____ on their male counterparts. They invest a lot of energy into conception, parturition (egg laying), and post-natal maternal behavior. Some courtship behavior may go on for hours.
Selective
In wolves, _____ bonds among pack members have several functions. Cooperation in hunting large prey, territorial defense, and breeding.
Social
Domestication seems to have _____ cooperative tendencies in dogs, mainly because cooperative breeding and hunting is significantly lower in dogs compared to wolves.
Reduced
The apparent _____ in cooperative breeding is not necessarily a maladaptive trait. The availability of food allows dog puppies to forage independently at a much younger age than wolf cubs.
Reduction
According to one study, in contrast to wolves, dogs have difficulties in _____ even in a very basic manner of simply doing things together. Is this an effect of domestication and selective breeding or adaptation to living in urban areas?
Cooperating
The parental behavior of canids entails teaching the cubs/pups to survive, including learning to be _____.
Social
Mothers towards pups are clear and firm, but do not _____ the pups.
Harm
Wolf fathers play a role in educating cubs when they start to leave the _____.
Den
In domesticated dogs, the canine father’s contributions are _____ or non-existent because we choose so.
Limited
Pups first learn social skills in their den (or maternity box in homes). The survival strategy is learning to be _____ and social when one or the other is the most adequate.
Independent
Siblings are the first of many things: social partners, competitors, and playmates. They experience their first fights, victories, and defeats. They learn to _____, be social, and survive.
Compromise
_____ is any phase-sensitive learning (at a particular age or life stage) that is rapid and (apparently) independent of consequences.
Imprinting
A lack of _____ interaction between 3 and 12-14th week promotes a fear for human beings.
Human
A lack of contact with other _____ between 3-12 weeks may result in identifying with other species (often human). This can lead to more “home alone” problems.
Dogs
Puppies start to show fearfulness of the unknown around week _____.
Five
From week 7-12, it’s time to learn dog language and _____ behavior expressions (ex: pacifying, aggressive, fearful, dominant, and submissive behaviors).
Agonistic
Puppies raised in stimulus-_____ environments are more prone to develop hyper-attachments to their new owners. This can lead to home alone problems and attention seeking behaviors.
Poor
Until about week _____ of age, a puppy’s urination and defecation is reflexive. At week 8-9 they start to show a preferred spot to void, at a certain distance from where they sleep and eat.
Three
Puppies pee on average once every _____ they are awake and active but can sleep for several hours without eliminating.
Hour
_____ is the process of learning to handle relationships with conspecifics as well as members of other species.
Socialization
Imprinting and socialization (in their strictest sense) cease about the __th week. However it’s important to provide a variety of stimulus-rich environments throughout its first year of life.
14
_____ behavior is a serious activity. We associate it with leisure, hobbies, and fun. We often overlook the essential role it plays in youngster’s development and the adults’ conflict resolution.
Play
Play is an integral part of the learning process in species with highly _____ nervous systems such as mammals and birds.
Complex
There are three general kinds of play depending on their primary function:
- _____ play
- _____ play
- _____ play.
Social / Locomotor / Object
_____ play teaches communication patterns. Communication helps to predict movements and the consequences of actions. Survival in nature depends on speedy and accurate assessments.
Social
_____ play is a play in which very young animals engage when alone. They exercise their motor skills. Theorized to help the cells in the cerebellum of the brain to develop connections. Through play they learn about their ability to control the environment and their limits.
Locomotor
_____ play teaches youngsters to handle the various natural elements, including the pieces of prey that the adults bring home to the den. Toys closer to natural environments tend to be more attractive like bones or a piece of skin.
Object
_____ play _____ games: Chasing, punching, pawing, wrestling, and biting, as they learn to stalk and kill prey.
Predators / Predators
_____ animals play _____ games: running and leaping as they acquire speed and agility.
Prey / Prey
Play behavior has a dual function:
(1) to learn how to handle _____/prey
(2) to learn how to deal with _____ (a member of the same species), especially members of the same pack/herd/group, so that one gets access to resources without wasting too much energy or cause a fatal injury to a mate.
Predator / Conspecifics
In some species, play has a function in adults, to try new social _____, which would be risky in real life situations.
Strategies
Play seems to be auto-motivating and self-_____. For example, cats hunt, not because they are hungry, but because it seems they derive pleasure from the art of hunting.
Reinforcing
The problems of group living derive mostly from cheating and _____. It may pay an individual to save time and reduce risks for its life by being more selfish.
Competition
Competition for _____ may lead to direct rivalry and waste a significant amount of energy and produce severe injuries as a consequence.
Mates
Social canids have developed mechanisms to decrease the cost of intergroup conflicts - _____, dominant and submissive strategies.
Hierarchies
The main environmental factors affecting group size are _____ and other predators or prey.
Food
The pack is fundamental to social canids in that they react strongly to being left _____, often howling to locate conspecifics or pack mates. This is the primary factor of domestic dogs showing home alone problems.
Alone
Howling also becomes a ritualized behavior, _____ the cohesion of a pack.
Strengthening
_____ behavior (to make peace) is about decreasing or suppressing an opponent’s aggressive or dominant behavior or restoring a state of tranquility.
Pacifying
There are two ways of classifying pacifying behavior:
(1) to include all behaviors with the function of diffusing social _____
(2) to restrict it to a particular _____ within the broader spectrum of conflict decreasing behavior.
Conflict / Range
_____ is a voluntary or spontaneous expression of submissive behavior.
Friendliness
The same behavior can achieve various functions depending on the _____ and sum of all behaviors being displayed at a given moment.
Intensity
Pacifying behavior was initially probably a _____. Like all phenotypes, it happened by chance and evolved thereafter.
Reflex
Pacifying behavior resolves _____. A _____ is a disagreement over a resource, which may lead to one or both parties showing aggressive behavior.
Conflict / Conflict
_____ are what an organism perceives as life necessities (food, mating partner, or patch of territory) What is perceived to be a resource depends on both species and the individual.
Resources
The _____ is the most frequent behavior of social canids. As potentially aggressive animals living together, they need to reassure one another of their peaceful intentions.
Greeting
_____ behaviors consist of ritualized infantile behavior such as muzzle nudge, pawing, and licking. They use these to pacify other animals as well, such as humans.
Greeting
The _____ _____ behavior originates with moving the muzzle to locate the mother’s teats and stimulate milk production. It becomes ritualized, assuming a new function when the infant grows up. This is a typical process in the development of single behavior patterns in all species.
Muzzle nudge
Social behavior and _____ are necessities imposed by some species because it confers them higher fitness levels: higher survival and reproduction rates. Their mating systems reflect their social organization.
Cooperation
_____ seems to have caused a reduction in cooperative tendencies in dogs, mainly because cooperative breeding and hunting is significantly lower in dogs compared to wolves.
Domestication
In contrast to wolves, dogs have _____ in cooperating even in a very basic manner of simply doing things together.
Difficulties
_____ Is the main factor affecting agonistic (combative) behavior.
Competition
As Darwin noted, all organisms are in a constant struggle for _____. Even when resources are available, there is still competition with conspecifics about priority access. The competition also applies to other animals within the same environment.
Survival
Some competitive behavior seems _____, while others are learned from parents or adult group mates.
Instinctive
Domesticated dogs are less social, less prone to _____ and cooperating because we removed them from their natural habitats.
Compromising
Our dogs can get away with their lacking social and _____ skills because they are no longer needed to the same degree as their wild cousins.
Agonistic
Competition calls for _____ or dominant behavior and their counterparts, fearful and submissive behavior. Social aggressive animals are masters of compromise, employing adequate dominant or submissive strategy required for the given situation. One size does not fit all.
Aggressive
_____ is the name of the game. The various displays of agonistic behavior and resulting multiple possible interactions testify to a painstaking evolution through the millennia.
Adaptation
_____ means of or related to interspecific confrontational behavior and includes aggressive, fearful, dominant, submissive, and pacifying behavior.
Agonistic
_____ behavior appears before aggressive behavior in the development of most young animals. Aggressive behavior in canids usually first appears when playing rough with littermates about 5-7 weeks of age.
Fearful
_____ behavior has life-saving functions.
Fearful
Fearful behavior is directed towards eliminating an incoming _____. (fleeing, freezing, or hiding). A threat is everything that may harm, inflict pain or injury, or decrease an individual’s chance of survival.
Threat
_____ elicits flight, immobility (freezing or hiding), or distressing behavior.
Fear
_____ behavior follows in the development of the young animals. Competitions within littermates over trivial matters trigger it.
However, the youngsters learn how to deal with it, what they can gain or lose, and how to control it. The right dosage of the right behavior at the right moment in the right circumstances is the secret to a successful life.
Aggressive
Aggressive behavior is a behavior directed towards eliminating _____ from an opponent by injuring it, inflicting pain, or giving it a reliable warning of such impending consequences if it takes no evasive action.
Competition
_____ behavior is distinguishable from dominant behavior in that dominance does not include harmful behaviors, though it may require some degree of forceful measures.
Aggressive
Predatory behavior is not _____ behavior. Predatory behavior means preying (searching, chasing, killing) upon other organisms for food.
Aggressive
_____ (or socio-aggressive) behavior is the behavior displayed by an individual with the function of gaining access to a particular resource on a particular occasion, versus a particular opponent, without either party incurring injury. If either incur injury, it is aggressive, not _____.
Dominant / Dominant
_____ is behavior directed towards eliminating competition, while dominance, or social-aggressiveness, is behavior directed toward eliminating competition from a mate.
Aggressiveness
