Animal personality research has become increasingly popular over the past few decades. The two main methods used to examine individual differences in animals are rating and coding. The rating method involves human scoring of an animal's behavioral tendencies along various behavioral dimensions, such ratings are typically based on the human rater's experience with the animal. The coding method also requires humans to score an animal's behavior, but differs in that the scoring is based on the animal's immediate behavior in a specific context. This brief report describes the use of both the rating and coding methods to examine personality within a group of 10 Garnett's bushbabies (Otolemur garnettii). The results indicated that individual personalities do exist in bushbabies, but also suggested that the rating method is heavily influenced by the rater's experience with an animal. Consequently, it is important that the nature of the rater's interactions with the target animals be considered when using the rating method to assess animal personality.

Recently the study of animal personality has become an important and credible topic of research and a number of studies have revealed personality traits in a variety of species. The

In order to test the validity of a Five Factor Model of personality on horses, a questionnaire was replicated from a previous study, with an added option of don’t know to the traditional 5-point Likert scale. Raters responded to seventeen items of the 60-item scale with don’t know responses greater than 10% of the time and these seventeen items were subsequently removed from the study. A Principal Components Analysis was used with the remaining items, resulting in eight factors: Neuroticism, Active, Conscientiousness, Agreeableness, Openness, Social Extraversion, Temperamental, and Disciplined. These components correspond well to the five components extracted in the original study, indicating good reliability of the scale. However, 17 items from the original questionnaire were deemed irrelevant by raters, indicating a threat to validity. Though the remaining items were able to be used in analyses, further studies should examine if these are in fact the most effective items to use in the investigation of equine personality.//

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