Measuring Behavior

Question 1

Why it’s important to measure behavior

Answer 1

• for understanding animal behavior
• necessary for solving behavior problems
• Understand ways to quantify behavior for tracking changes in behavior over time when providing treatments
• Helps us ID animals w/ medical conditions => very important for identifying pain

Question 2

operational definition

Answer 2

• articulate the precise physical movements that must be met to record that a behavior has occurred

Question 3

ethogram

Answer 3

collection of behaviors defined using operational definitions, used in ethological research

Question 4

scientific study of animal behavior

Answer 4

• need to be careful about subjectivity
• use methods of measuring behavior to:
  
  • learn more about problem
  • incorporate into our treatment plan
  • track treatment success - quantify it

Questions to ask:
- How frequent does behavior occur?
- What time of day do behaviors occur?
- What is the duration of the time the behaviors occur?
- Is there a simple stimulus that occurs before behavior occurs
- What happens after behavior occurs

Question 5

Approaching behavior problems

Answer 5

• describe its structure: appearance or physical form or temporal pattern
  
  • describing pet’s posture or anatomical movements
• describing its consequences: effects of the pet’s behavior
  
  • environment, other people, other pets, itself
  • describe w/o reference to how the effects are achieved

Question 6

Objective measurements

Answer 6

• recording of the # of times the animal performs a behavior during a set amount of time
• ex: 3 lips licks in 12 hours
• provide more accurate and reliable data

Question 7

subjective measurements

Answer 7

• no quantification and/or operational definitions, at risk of variance due to individual interpretation
• ex: person’s overall impression of animal’s behavior - looks hungry, pupil dilation assessed by looking at animal, body condition scoring w/o definitions describing each score

Question 8

common measures of behavior

Answer 8

• latency: duration of time from some specified event, to the onset of the first occurrence of the behavior of interest
• frequency: number of occurrences of the behavior of interest per unit time
  
  • Not only a count measure - also a rate of occurrence (#/time)
• duration: amount of time for which a single occurrence of the behavior of interest lasts
  
  • Can also be measured as a proportion or percentage

Question 9

behavior patterns

Answer 9

• techniques used to record & quantify or describe a behavior

events
- distinct actions of short duration that can be approximated as discrete points in time
- ex: cough, paw lift, snaps by angry dog, blinks
- The # of events is commonly the measure of interest

states
- activities that animals engage in for prolonged periods of time
- ex: playing, walking, lying, digging, pacing, sleeping
- The duration of states is the measure of interest

Question 10

behavior sampling techniques

Answer 10

instantaneous sampling
- behavior of each subject is recorded “on the beep” at the instant of a pre-determined interval
- ex: recording ear position every 15s

interval sampling
- full and complete recording of the events and states of the subjects during a regular & repeating specified interval of time
- ex: record of behaviors for 5 min every 30 min, for 5 hours; therefore total time recording = 10 x 5 min = 50 min

continuous sampling
- full and complete recording of the events and states of the subjects during for the period of time of interest
- ex: record all activity in 24 hours