Comparative Psychology Commons^™

Using Object-Choice Tasks To Investigate Sensory Perception In Sunda Pangolins (Manis Javanica), Joshua Dipaola

Theses and Dissertations

Pangolins are one of the most heavily poached, yet least understood mammals in the world. In this study, we used an object-choice task to assess the ecological relevance and use of sensory information in Sunda pangolin foraging behavior. This is the first controlled experiment on pangolin behavior to our knowledge.

Regional Differences In Wild North American River Otter (Lontra Canadensis) Behavior And Communication, Sarah Walkley

Dissertations

This study focuses on the vocalization repertoires of wild North American river otters (Lontra canadensis) in New York and California. Although they are the same species, these two established populations of river otters are separated by a significant distance and are distinct from one another. River otters are semi-aquatic social predators that can be found throughout North America. This is the first study to examine the vocalizations of wild river otters, and results are compared across field sites in the different regions. River otter vocalizations and behaviors in New York were recorded using Bushnell Aggressor trail cameras that …

Agonistic Grooming In Multiple Lemur Species, Jennie L. Christopher

Dissertations

Social behaviors are represented in every animal species regardless of the level of sociability found in the species. At the very least, conspecifics must interact for the continuation of the species. Depending on species, social behavior could merely consist of mating and territorial disputes, it could consist of a multitude of social behaviors that provide a way of navigating a complex societal structure, or it could consist of any level of interaction between those extremes. However, the behaviors that make up these social repertoires are not universal across species. They could differ in either the form or function of the …

Reported Behavioural Differences Between Geldings And Mares Challenge Sex-Driven Stereotypes In Ridden Equine Behaviour, Anna Aune, Kate Fenner, Bethany Wilson, Elissa Cameron, Andrew Mclean, Paul Mcgreevy

Anthropomorphism and Anthropocentrism Collection

Horse trainers and riders may have preconceived ideas of horse temperament based solely on the sex of the horse. A study (n = 1233) of horse enthusiasts (75% of whom had more than 8 years of riding experience) revealed that riders prefer geldings over mares and stallions. While these data may reflect different sex preferences in horses used for sport, they may also reduce the chances of some horses reaching their performance potential. Further, an unfounded sex prejudice is likely to contribute to unconscious bias when perceiving unwanted behaviours, simplistically attributing them to demographic characteristics rather than more complex legacies …

Sequential Analysis Of Livestock Herding Dog And Sheep Interactions, Jonathan Early, Jessica Alders, Elizabeth R. Arnott, Claire M. Wade, Paul Mcgreevy

Interactive Behavior Collection

Livestock herding dogs are crucial contributors to Australian agriculture. However, there is a dearth of empirical studies of the behavioural interactions between dog and livestock during herding. A statistical approach that may reveal cause and effect in such interactions is lag sequential analysis. Using 48 video recordings of livestock herding dogs and sheep in a yard trial competition, event-based (time between behaviours is irrelevant) and time-based (time between behaviours is defined) lag sequential analyses identified several significant behavioural interactions (adjusted residuals greater than 2.58; the maximum likelihood-ratio chi-squared statistic for all eight contingency tables identified all sequences as highly significant …

Social Referencing In The Domestic Horse, Anne Schrimpf, Marie-Sophie Single, Christian Nawroth

Recognition Collection

Dogs and cats use human emotional information directed to an unfamiliar situation to guide their behavior, known as social referencing. It is not clear whether other domestic species show similar socio-cognitive abilities in interacting with humans. We investigated whether horses (n = 46) use human emotional information to adjust their behavior to a novel object and whether the behavior of horses differed depending on breed type. Horses were randomly assigned to one of two groups: an experimenter positioned in the middle of a test arena directed gaze and voice towards the novel object with either (a) a positive or (b) …

Musical Dogs: A Review Of The Influence Of Auditory Enrichment On Canine Health And Behavior, Abigail Lindig, Paul Mcgreevy, Angela Crean

Stress Collection

Music therapy yields many positive health outcomes in humans, but the effects of music on the health and welfare of nonhuman animals vary greatly with the type of music played, the ethology of the species, and the personality and learning history of individual animals. One context in which music therapy may be used to enhance animal welfare is to alleviate stress in domestic environments. Here, we review studies of the effects of music exposure on dogs as a case study for the implementation of music therapy in veterinary medicine. Nine reports of experimental testing for the therapeutic effects of music …

Is Enrichment Always Enriching And How Would You Know? Unintended Consequences And The Importance Of Formal Assessment Of Enrichment Programs In Bottlenose Dolphins (Tursiops Truncatus), Heidi Lyn, Hannah Bahe, Megan S. Broadway, Mystera M. Samuelson, Jamie K. Shelley, Tim Hoffland, Emma Jarvis, Kelly Pulis, Delphine Shannon, Mobashir Solangi

Student Publications

Bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus) are viewed as a highly intelligent species capable of complex behaviors. This requires marine parks to maintain dynamic environmental enrichment programs in order to ensure dolphins’ optimal psychological and physiological well-being while in human care. In this study, two experiments were conducted to determine the effects of different forms of enrichment on the behavior of four bottlenose dolphins. In Experiment 1, multiple forms of novel enrichment resulted in a shift away from individual swim patterns – a change that is associated with increased behavioral diversity and so often considered an improvement in animal welfare …

Social Learning In Solitary Juvenile Sharks, Catarina Vila Pouca, Dennis Heinrich, Charlie Huveneers, Culum Brown

Social Behavior Collection

Social learning can be a shortcut for acquiring locally adaptive information. Animals that live in social groups have better access to social information, but gregarious and nonsocial species are also frequently exposed to social cues. Thus, social learning might simply reflect an animal's general ability to learn rather than an adaptation to social living. Here, we investigated social learning and the effect of frequency of social exposure in nonsocial, juvenile Port Jackson sharks, Heterodontus portusjacksoni. We compared (1) Individual Learners, (2) Sham-Observers, paired with a naïve shark, and (3) Observers, paired with a trained demonstrator, in a novel foraging task. …

Whether Invertebrates Are Sentient Matters To Bioethics And Science Policy, Michael L. Woodruff

Animal Sentience

Mikhalevich & Powell provide convincing empirical evidence that at least some invertebrates are sentient and hence should be granted moral status. I agree and argue that functional markers should be the primary indicators of sentience. Neuroanatomical homologies provide only secondary evidence. Consensus regarding the validity of these functional markers will be difficult to achieve. To be effective in practice, functional markers of sentience will have to be tested and accepted species by species to overcome the implicit biases against extending moral status to invertebrates.

A Cross-Cultural Comparison Of The Cognitive And Mental Health Repercussions Of Childhood Adversity In Adulthood, Sara Grace Comella

UNF Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The majority of individuals in the United States experience at least one type of traumatic during childhood (“Understanding Child Trauma”, 2017). Individuals with childhood adversity have an increased incidence of depression, anxiety, and alcohol abuse during adulthood (Rehan et al., 2017). However, the consequences of early adversity are not limited to mental health and extend to areas of cognitive functioning (e.g., working memory). The present research study addresses the long-term consequences of childhood adversity on psychological and cognitive functioning. Data collection took place online from February 2019 - April 2019 in Iceland and the United States. The survey assessed outcomes …

Construct Validity Of The Behavior Assessment System For Children-Third Edition Teacher Rating Scales (Basc-3 Trs): Comparisons With The Adjustment Scales For Children And Adolescents (Asca), Shannon Burback

Masters Theses

The Behavior Assessment Scale for Children-Third Edition Teacher Rating Scale Child Form (BASC-3 TRS-C) and the Adjustment Scales for Children and Adolescents (ASCA) are both teacher rating scales which may be used by school psychologist to assess youth behavior problems. The BASC, BASC-2, and BASC-3 have limited replicated research of the studies reported in their respective manuals. Therefore, it was important to empirically compare the BASC-3 TRS-C with the ASCA to examine construct validity (convergent, discriminant, and divergent) as there were, at present, no published studies replicating BASC-3 Manual research. The present study analyzed BASC-3 TRS-C and ACSA ratings which …

The Midsession Reversal Task With Pigeons: Effects Of A Brief Delay Between Choice And Reinforcement, Megan Ashley Halloran

Theses and Dissertations--Psychology

During a midsession reversal task, the session begins with a simple simultaneous discrimination in which one stimulus (S1) is correct and the alternate stimulus (S2) is incorrect (S1+/S2-). At the halfway point, the discrimination reverses and S2 becomes the correct choice (S2+/S1-). When choosing optimally, a pigeon should choose S1 until the first trial in which it is not reinforced and then shift to S2 (win-stay/lose-shift). With this task pigeons have been shown to respond suboptimally by anticipating the reversal (anticipatory errors) and continuing to choose S1 after the reversal (perseverative errors). This suboptimal behavior may result from a pigeon’s …

The Demography And Practice Of Australians Caring For Native Wildlife And The Psychological, Physical And Financial Effects Of Rescue, Rehabilitation And Release Of Wildlife On The Welfare Of Carers, Bruce Englefield, Steve Candy, Melissa J. Starling, Paul Mcgreevy

Human-Animal Bonds Collection

The rescue, rehabilitation and release of injured and orphaned Australian wildlife is managed by over 20,000 carers, mostly voluntarily. These volunteers experience mental, physical and financial challenges that have not been researched adequately. This study collated the responses (n = 316) to a survey conducted among Australian wildlife carers who actively foster orphaned joeys for hand-raising and injured adult mammals for rehabilitation and release. It confirmed 86% of rehabilitators are female, 70% are over the age of 46 years and their prime motivation is an affinity with animals. The average time spent in the sector is 11.5 years, and the …

Personality And Coping, Alyssa Seely

Intuition: The BYU Undergraduate Journal of Psychology

No abstract provided.

The Question Of Animal Awareness, Francoise Wemelsfelder

Françoise Wemelsfelder, PhD

The problem of animal awareness lies at the interface of science and philosophy. As a starting point for the study of phenomena such as awareness, mind, consciousness, etc., we hardly have any reference other than our own human experience and in the context of a nondualistic ontology this can be justified. In philosophy and psychology it appears to be very difficult to give direct operational definitions of terms such as consciousness, etc. So we might expect this to be even more difficult in the study of animals. A detailed knowledge of animals and their behaviour is necessary in order to …

Animal Boredom: Is A Scientific Study Of The Subjective Experiences Of Animals Possible?, Françoise Wemelsfelder

Françoise Wemelsfelder, PhD

The aim of this paper is to explore the relationship between different meta-scientific frameworks and the science of animal welfare. Animal Boredom 117 During the past few years, I have become more and more convinced that the great difficulty science has in studying subjective experience in its objects, might be related to the denial of any role to subjective experience in the observer as an interpretational guide. Can a quality in the world around us be observed, when this same quality is deliberately excluded from the process of observing?

As a practical example for the discussion described above, the phenomenon …

Impact Of Stress, Fear And Anxiety On The Nociceptive Responses Of Larval Zebrafish, Javier Lopez-Luna, Qussay Al-Jubouri, Lynne U. Sneddon

Lynne Sneddon, PhD

Both adult and larval zebrafish have been demonstrated to show behavioural responses to noxious stimulation but also to potentially stress- and fear or anxiety- eliciting situations. The pain or nociceptive response can be altered and modulated by these situations in adult fish through a mechanism called stress-induced analgesia. However, this phenomenon has not been described in larval fish yet. Therefore, this study explores the behavioural changes in larval zebrafish after noxious stimulation and exposure to challenges that can trigger a stress, fear or anxiety reaction. Five-day post fertilization zebrafish were exposed to either a stressor (air emersion), a predatory fear …

Hpi Reactivity Does Not Reflect Changes In Personality Among Trout Introduced To Bold Or Shy Social Groups, Jack S. Thomson, Phillip C. Watts, Tom G. Pottinger, Lynne U. Sneddon

Lynne Sneddon, PhD

Physiological stress responses often correlate with personalities (e.g., boldness). However, this relationship can become decoupled, although the mechanisms underlying changes in this relationship are poorly understood. Here we quantify (1) how an individual’s boldness (response to novel objects) in rainbow trout, Oncorhynchus mykiss, changes in response to interactions with a population of either bold or shy conspecifics and we (2) measured associated post-stress cortisol levels. Initially-bold trout became shyer regardless of group composition, whereas shy trout remained shy demonstrating that bold individuals are more plastic. Stress-induced plasma cortisol reflected the original personality of fish but not the personality induced …

Do Painful Sensations And Fear Exist In Fish?, Lynne U. Sneddon

Lynne Sneddon, PhD

The detection of pain and fear in fi sh has been subject to much debate and, since fi sh are a popular experimental model and commercially important in both angling and aquaculture, many procedures that fi sh are subjected to cause injury, fear and stress. These injuries would give rise to the sensation of pain in humans but whether fi sh have the capacity for pain is relatively under explored. Recent evidence has shown that fi sh have the same neural apparatus to detect pain that mammals and humans do, that their brain is active during a potentially painful experience, …