The Other End of the Leash: An Experimental Test to Analyze How Owners Interact with Their Pet Dogs

Abstract

It has been suggested that the way in which owners interact with their dogs can largely vary and influence the dog-owner bond, but very few objective studies, so far, have addressed how the owner interacts with the dog. The goal of the present study was to record dog owners' interaction styles by means of objective observation and coding. The experiment included eight standardized situations in which owners of pet dogs were asked to perform specific tasks including both positive (i.e. playing, teaching a new task, showing a preference towards an object in a food searching task, greeting after separation) and potentially distressing tasks (i.e. physical restriction during DNA sampling, putting a T-shirt onto the dog, giving basic obedience commands while the dog was distracted). The video recordings were coded off-line using a specifically designed coding scheme including scores for communication, social support, warmth, enthusiasm, and play style, as well as frequency of behaviors like petting, praising, commands, and attention sounds. Exploratory Factor Analysis of the 20 variables measured revealed 3 factors, labeled as Owner Warmth, Owner Social Support, and Owner Control, which can be viewed as analogues to parenting style dimensions. The experimental procedure introduced here represents the first standardized measure of interaction styles of dog owners. The methodology presented here is a useful tool to investigate individual variation in the interaction style of pet dog owners that can be used to explain differences in the dog-human relationship, dogs' behavioral outcomes, and dogs stress coping strategies, all crucial elements both from a theoretical and applied point of view.

Two Ends of the Leash: Relations Between Personality of Shelter Volunteers and On-leash Walking Behavior With Shelter Dogs

“…It was hypothesized that volunteers with higher scores on neuroticism would use more gestural and verbal cues (Kis et al, 2012) and pull harder on the leash, in order to have a better control over the dog (Kotrschal et al, 2009). In line with a previous study, volunteers scoring high on extraversion were expected to praise the dogs more (Kis et al, 2012), and those that were more open (Cimarelli et al, 2017) or agreeable (Payne et al, 2015) would pull the leash less frequently and allow dogs to explore without interfering with them by commanding or attempting to attract their attention. Frequency of dog pulling might increase in volunteers with more open personalities if they allowed the dogs to explore freely when walking (Cimarelli et al, 2017).…”

“…Despite the comprehensive literature on human-dog interactions, limited research has focused on the influence of human personality (Kis et al, 2012). Human personality is widely accepted to be associated with our perceptions and behaviors (Tasa et al, 2010;Kis et al, 2012), including the way we interact with dogs (Wedl et al, 2010;Kis et al, 2012;Cimarelli et al, 2016Cimarelli et al, , 2017. The "similarity-attraction hypothesis, " which proposes that we share similar personality traits, physical attractiveness, and attitudes with our partners, has also been used to describe the owner-dog partnership (Turcsán et al, 2012).…”

“…Open and neurotic owners tend to use more gestural and verbal cues when commanding their dogs, while extroverted owners praise their dogs more often (Kis et al, 2012). Owners scoring high for openness score low for owner control (the tendency to use commands) (Cimarelli et al, 2017) but high on owner warmth (enthusiasm and prone to communicating with rather than commanding their dogs) (Cimarelli et al, 2016). Working dog handlers with high ratings for agreeableness tended not to clash with dogs and were less inclined to verbally correct them during the training (Payne et al, 2015).…”

“…Working dog handlers with high ratings for agreeableness tended not to clash with dogs and were less inclined to verbally correct them during the training (Payne et al, 2015). Owners scoring high for conscientiousness score lower on owner social support (inclined toward praising and petting) (Cimarelli et al, 2017). As for the dogs, they take longer to obey a command if owners score high on neuroticism (Kis et al, 2012).…”

“…The majority of studies related to human personality and the human-dog dyad used owners and pet dogs (Kis et al, 2012;Turcsán et al, 2012;Cimarelli et al, 2017), thereby ensuring a relatively long-term relationship with a strong bond in most relationships. Similar studies have not been conducted in animal shelters (Walker, 2014), where dogs generally have had a shorter relationship and a weaker bond with shelter volunteers/personnel.…”