ETHOWATCHER: validation of a tool for behavioral and video-tracking analysis in laboratory animals

Abstract

We present a software (ETHOWATCHER(®)) developed to support ethography, object tracking and extraction of kinematic variables from digital video files of laboratory animals. The tracking module allows controlled segmentation of the target from the background, extracting image attributes used to calculate the distance traveled, orientation, length, area and a path graph of the experimental animal. The ethography module allows recording of catalog-based behaviors from environment or from video files continuously or frame-by-frame. The output reports duration, frequency and latency of each behavior and the sequence of events in a time-segmented format, set by the user. Validation tests were conducted on kinematic measurements and on the detection of known behavioral effects of drugs. This software is freely available at www.ethowatcher.ufsc.br.

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“…Locomotor activity ( total distance ) of the animals was analyzed offline by means of the digital tracking software Viewer 3 (Bioobserve GmbH). Total time spent in each compartment was evaluated by an investigator using EthoWatcher software (Crispim Junior et al, 2012). …”

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Kinoscope: An Open-Source Computer Program for Behavioral Pharmacologists

“…In addition, automated algorithms may provide better scoring than humans in some cases (Desland et al, 2014) but may also provide less accurate and detailed analysis than humans in certain other cases, as in the forced swim test (distinguishing fine transitions between swimming, climbing and immobility behaviors) and novel object recognition (distinguishing active interest toward the object vs. near vicinity of the animal's head). Several attempts have been done over the last 20 years to develop open-source or freely available computer programs for scoring animal behavior (Moraes and Ferrarezi, 1997; Ottoni, 2000; Taiwanica, 2000; Patel et al, 2006; Poirrier et al, 2006; Aguiar et al, 2007; Blumstein and Daniel, 2007; Otero et al, 2010; Crispim Junior et al, 2012; de Chaumont et al, 2012; Telonis and Margarity, 2015; Friard et al, 2016). Some of those attempts resulted in outdated and probably not under active development computer programs, some were focused on specific models that could not be easily modified for other settings, and some resulted in elaborat solutions that required a significant investment in human resources to develop, adapt and operate.…”