Tiira Katriina, Lohi Hannes
Department of Veterinary Biosciences and Research Programs Unit, Molecular Neurology, P.O.Box 63, 00014 University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland; The Folkhälsan Research Center, Helsinki, Finland.
PLoS One. 2015 Nov 3;10(11):e0141907. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0141907. eCollection 2015.
Personality and anxiety disorders across species are affected by genetic and environmental factors. Shyness-boldness personality continuum exists across species, including the domestic dog, with a large within- and across-breed variation. Domestic dogs are also diagnosed for several anxiety-related behavioral conditions, such as generalized anxiety disorders, phobias, and separation anxiety. Genetic and environmental factors contributing to personality and anxiety are largely unknown. We collected questionnaire data from a Finnish family dog population (N = 3264) in order to study the associating environmental factors for canine fearfulness, noise sensitivity, and separation anxiety. Early life experiences and exercise were found to associate with anxiety prevalence. We found that fearful dogs had less socialization experiences (p = 0.002) and lower quality of maternal care (p < 0.0001) during puppyhood. Surprisingly, the largest environmental factor associating with noise sensitivity (p < 0.0001) and separation anxiety (p = 0.007) was the amount of daily exercise; dogs with noise sensitivity and separation anxiety had less daily exercise. Our findings suggest that dogs share many of the same environmental factors that contribute to anxiety in other species as well, such as humans and rodents. Our study highlights the importance of early life experiences, especially the quality of maternal care and daily exercise for the welfare and management of the dogs, and reveals important confounding factors to be considered in the genetic characterization of canine anxiety.
跨物种的人格和焦虑症受遗传和环境因素影响。害羞-大胆的人格连续体存在于包括家犬在内的跨物种中，品种内和品种间存在很大差异。家犬也被诊断出患有几种与焦虑相关的行为病症，如广泛性焦虑症、恐惧症和分离焦虑症。导致人格和焦虑的遗传和环境因素在很大程度上尚不清楚。我们收集了来自芬兰家犬群体（N = 3264）的问卷数据，以研究与犬类恐惧、噪音敏感性和分离焦虑相关的环境因素。发现早期生活经历和运动量与焦虑患病率有关。我们发现，恐惧的犬在幼犬期的社交经历较少（p = 0.002），母性照顾质量较低（p < 0.0001）。令人惊讶的是，与噪音敏感性（p < 0.0001）和分离焦虑（p = 0.007）相关的最大环境因素是每日运动量；有噪音敏感性和分离焦虑的犬每日运动量较少。我们的研究结果表明，犬类也与其他物种（如人类和啮齿动物）一样，有许多导致焦虑的相同环境因素。我们的研究强调了早期生活经历的重要性，特别是母性照顾质量和每日运动量对犬类福利和管理的重要性，并揭示了在犬类焦虑的遗传特征研究中需要考虑的重要混杂因素。
