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Dissecting genetic and non-genetic influences on dog personality
Journal of Veterinary Behavior 10 (2015) 438e448
Contents lists available at ScienceDirect
Journal of Veterinary Behavior journal homepage: www.journalvetbehavior.com
Abstracts ABSTRACTS FROM THE CANINE BEHAVIOUR AND GENETICS MEETING, LONDON, UK, 26-28 JUNE 2015 The US Army Research Office, in partnership with The Kennel Club, Dogs Trust, the Animal Health Trust, and UK dstl, and with support from Royal Canin and Dick White Referrals, convened a meeting in London to bring together international researchers from a variety of backgrounds to discuss their interests in canine behaviour and/or genetics. The goals were to foster future profitable collaborations and to identify areas where collaborative research may provide new perspectives and paradigms. These are the abstracts from that meeting. Royal Canin offered two prizes to early career researchers: 1 in behaviour and 1 in genetics, and the winners are noted in the poster section. A future issue of Journal of Veterinary Behavior: Clinical Applications and Research, edited by Dr. Tiny de Keuster, of the University of Ghent, will publish the papers of the winners of the poster competition and those of the speakers, along with an editorial, and a commentary/summary by Drs. Dan O’Neill and Rowena Parker of the Royal Veterinary College, UK. Karen L. Overall, Editor-in-Chief
1 Dissecting genetic and non-genetic influences on dog personality PAMELA WIENER 1, *, JOANNA J. ILSKA 2, SARAH E. LOFGREN 1, ENRIQUE SÁNCHEZ-MOLANO 1, DYLAN N. CLEMENTS 1, JOHN A. WOOLLIAMS 1, SARAH C. BLOTT 3, MARIE J. HASKELL 2 1 The Roslin Institute and Royal (Dick) School of Veterinary Science, University of Edinburgh, Easter Bush, Scotland, UK 2 Scotland’s Rural College, West Mains Road, Edinburgh, Scotland, UK 3 School of Veterinary Medicine and Science, University of Nottingham, Leicestershire, UK *Corresponding author: [email protected] Personality has been defined as individual consistency in behavioural responsiveness to stimuli and situations, and is recognized in a wide range of animal species, including dogs. The distinct behavioural characteristics of individual dog breeds suggest a strong genetic component to personality in this species and there is also clear evidence for within-breed variation. We carried out a study on the factors influencing personality traits in the Labrador retriever, the most popular dog breed in the UK. Dogs were evaluated using a standard owner-assessed questionnaire, The Canine Behaviour and Research Questionnaire (C-BARQ). We first applied multivariate statistical techniques to define 12 discrete aspects of the 101 C-BARQ questions, which we defined as personality traits (Agitated-when-Ignored, Attention-Seeking, Barking-Tendency, Excitability, Fetching, Human-and-Object Fear, Noise-Fear, Nonowner-directed-Aggression, Owner-directed-Aggression, Separation-Anxiety, Trainability and Unusual-Behaviour). Of several physical and environmental factors considered, the “role” of the dog (i.e. working dog, pet, show dog), influenced by both genetic and non-genetic elements, had the strongest association with the personality traits; coat colour, sex and exercise levels were also associated with many of the traits. Using both pedigree-based and genomic approaches, we further investigated the genetic basis of the 12 personality traits. Heritability estimates for the traits ranged from 0 to 0.38. Analysis of genomic data revealed clustering within the breed; an individual’s genetic cluster was significantly associated with several personality traits. Genome-wide association analyses identified specific genomic regions significantly associated with some traits; the largest effect was found for Trainability. 1558-7878/$ e see front matter
Keywords: canine; personality; temperament; genetics; genome-wide association study
quantitative
2 The genetics of complex traits e applying theory to selection on behaviour T.W. LEWIS* The Kennel Club, 1-5 Clarges St, Piccadilly, London W1J 8AB *Corresponding author: [email protected] Quantitative genetic theory posits that for complex traits, those under the influence of multiple genes and environmental factors, effective selection can be achieved without specific knowledge of the location or variants of genes which influence the trait in question. Since only genes are inherited, and because genes are shared to a predictable degree between relatives, quantitative genetic analysis enables more efficient use of phenotypic and pedigree data to estimate the genetic ‘liability’ of a trait for each animal in the pedigree. Selecting on these ‘liabilities’ is substantially more accurate than selection on phenotype, since non-genetic influences on the phenotype are discounted and the performance of relatives is taken into account. By extension, analysis of the genetic liability for multiple traits yields information on how traits are genetically related, and enables the calculation of indices delivering optimal selective efficacy for a series of objectives. Such technologies are well-established in livestock production, delivering substantial improvements in the accuracy of selection compared to phenotypic selection, and have more recently been introduced into the field of canine health. It is reasonable to expect that most behavioural traits are complex, which is borne out by very few reports of individual genes of large effect on behaviour. Finding and quantifying the specific genes involved is likely to require very large phenotypic datasets, and the results may not have the anticipated impact on improving accuracy of selection. Therefore, quantitative genetic techniques currently provide the best method of breeding for requisite canine behavioural traits to accomplish specific tasks. Keywords: accuracy of selection; heritability; estimated breeding values; genetic correlation; selection index
Contents lists available at ScienceDirect
Journal of Veterinary Behavior journal homepage: www.journalvetbehavior.com
Abstracts ABSTRACTS FROM THE CANINE BEHAVIOUR AND GENETICS MEETING, LONDON, UK, 26-28 JUNE 2015 The US Army Research Office, in partnership with The Kennel Club, Dogs Trust, the Animal Health Trust, and UK dstl, and with support from Royal Canin and Dick White Referrals, convened a meeting in London to bring together international researchers from a variety of backgrounds to discuss their interests in canine behaviour and/or genetics. The goals were to foster future profitable collaborations and to identify areas where collaborative research may provide new perspectives and paradigms. These are the abstracts from that meeting. Royal Canin offered two prizes to early career researchers: 1 in behaviour and 1 in genetics, and the winners are noted in the poster section. A future issue of Journal of Veterinary Behavior: Clinical Applications and Research, edited by Dr. Tiny de Keuster, of the University of Ghent, will publish the papers of the winners of the poster competition and those of the speakers, along with an editorial, and a commentary/summary by Drs. Dan O’Neill and Rowena Parker of the Royal Veterinary College, UK. Karen L. Overall, Editor-in-Chief
1 Dissecting genetic and non-genetic influences on dog personality PAMELA WIENER 1, *, JOANNA J. ILSKA 2, SARAH E. LOFGREN 1, ENRIQUE SÁNCHEZ-MOLANO 1, DYLAN N. CLEMENTS 1, JOHN A. WOOLLIAMS 1, SARAH C. BLOTT 3, MARIE J. HASKELL 2 1 The Roslin Institute and Royal (Dick) School of Veterinary Science, University of Edinburgh, Easter Bush, Scotland, UK 2 Scotland’s Rural College, West Mains Road, Edinburgh, Scotland, UK 3 School of Veterinary Medicine and Science, University of Nottingham, Leicestershire, UK *Corresponding author: [email protected] Personality has been defined as individual consistency in behavioural responsiveness to stimuli and situations, and is recognized in a wide range of animal species, including dogs. The distinct behavioural characteristics of individual dog breeds suggest a strong genetic component to personality in this species and there is also clear evidence for within-breed variation. We carried out a study on the factors influencing personality traits in the Labrador retriever, the most popular dog breed in the UK. Dogs were evaluated using a standard owner-assessed questionnaire, The Canine Behaviour and Research Questionnaire (C-BARQ). We first applied multivariate statistical techniques to define 12 discrete aspects of the 101 C-BARQ questions, which we defined as personality traits (Agitated-when-Ignored, Attention-Seeking, Barking-Tendency, Excitability, Fetching, Human-and-Object Fear, Noise-Fear, Nonowner-directed-Aggression, Owner-directed-Aggression, Separation-Anxiety, Trainability and Unusual-Behaviour). Of several physical and environmental factors considered, the “role” of the dog (i.e. working dog, pet, show dog), influenced by both genetic and non-genetic elements, had the strongest association with the personality traits; coat colour, sex and exercise levels were also associated with many of the traits. Using both pedigree-based and genomic approaches, we further investigated the genetic basis of the 12 personality traits. Heritability estimates for the traits ranged from 0 to 0.38. Analysis of genomic data revealed clustering within the breed; an individual’s genetic cluster was significantly associated with several personality traits. Genome-wide association analyses identified specific genomic regions significantly associated with some traits; the largest effect was found for Trainability. 1558-7878/$ e see front matter
Keywords: canine; personality; temperament; genetics; genome-wide association study
quantitative
2 The genetics of complex traits e applying theory to selection on behaviour T.W. LEWIS* The Kennel Club, 1-5 Clarges St, Piccadilly, London W1J 8AB *Corresponding author: [email protected] Quantitative genetic theory posits that for complex traits, those under the influence of multiple genes and environmental factors, effective selection can be achieved without specific knowledge of the location or variants of genes which influence the trait in question. Since only genes are inherited, and because genes are shared to a predictable degree between relatives, quantitative genetic analysis enables more efficient use of phenotypic and pedigree data to estimate the genetic ‘liability’ of a trait for each animal in the pedigree. Selecting on these ‘liabilities’ is substantially more accurate than selection on phenotype, since non-genetic influences on the phenotype are discounted and the performance of relatives is taken into account. By extension, analysis of the genetic liability for multiple traits yields information on how traits are genetically related, and enables the calculation of indices delivering optimal selective efficacy for a series of objectives. Such technologies are well-established in livestock production, delivering substantial improvements in the accuracy of selection compared to phenotypic selection, and have more recently been introduced into the field of canine health. It is reasonable to expect that most behavioural traits are complex, which is borne out by very few reports of individual genes of large effect on behaviour. Finding and quantifying the specific genes involved is likely to require very large phenotypic datasets, and the results may not have the anticipated impact on improving accuracy of selection. Therefore, quantitative genetic techniques currently provide the best method of breeding for requisite canine behavioural traits to accomplish specific tasks. Keywords: accuracy of selection; heritability; estimated breeding values; genetic correlation; selection index