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PART THREE - Ethogram of Agonistic
Behaviours
How to use this ethogram
When you observe a dog, or the interaction of a dog
with another individual, it's natural to use expressions
such as “he's timid”, or “he's acting like a bully”. An
ethogram steps back from this level.
An ethogram instead describes behaviours without
interpreting them, without trying to explain them if not
in terms of the category they fall into (social contact,
imposing, agonistic, fear and stress, play,
predation...). The aim is to recognise the behaviours,
and to develop a framework with which to analyse them
that is as objective and unbiased as possibile. Using
it, anyone who sees a dog displaying an agonistic pucker
will be able to describe the event, photograph it or
film it.
The observation of a behaviour and recognition of
exactly what it is that we have seen become the premises
for any subsequent evaluation, and make it possible to
then move on to the next step: finding the answers to
questions such as -- at what age does this behaviour
emerge ? what is the function of this behaviour? what
costs, and what advantages, does this behaviour have for
the individual displaying it ? What consequences will
that behaviour have in an interaction ? What information
does that behaviour give us about the emotional state,
social skills and temperament of the dog who displayed
it ?
With respect to observing and describing a behaviour,
interpreting it involves us adding subjective elements
to the analysis, such as our experience, such as
experience, insight, empathy and expertise.
Anyone can learn to observe and understand what dogs
are saying to each other: there's nothing magical or
mysterious to it, although it obviously requires time,
effort, and experience.
Splitters & lumpers
A well-known statistics textbook dedicates a chapter to
two different philosophies for behaviour analysis.
The “splitters” tend to distinguish the single elements
that make up a behaviour, or variations in a behaviour.
The “lumpers” on the contrary tend to group together
similar behaviours, and behaviours exhibited in fixed
patterns.
In other words, if I observe a dog that is about to
launch an attack, I can insert all of the behaviours
exhibited into a single definition of “attack stance”,
or I can describe the single elements that it includes:
offensive facial display, standing tall, frontal
stance...
There's no doubt that I am a splitter. For me, a dog
licking its nose and licking its flews are two distinct
behaviors, and one of my objectives is to understand why
dogs sometimes lick their nose and sometimes lick their
flews.
While the disadvantage is that this multiplies the
number of behaviours for me to observe, the advantage is
that it enables me to analyse the behaviour in great
detail. The question is: which of these behaviours are
important in communication between dogs ? Which of these
behaviours can help us to understand the emotional state
and the intentions of the dog ?
Often it is the small details that make the difference,
and this is one reason why so many people are convinced
that dogs attack “without warning”, when it is instead
quite likely that the dog - at least from his point of
view - had been extremely clear in declaring his
intentions. A fundamental finding in my research on
aggression is that an increase in the level of
aggression is in general associated with extremely
subtle signals. Only rarely is intense aggression
preceded by spectacular threat displays before the
attack: instead, the dog will display a hard eye,
raising his glance to meet the eyes of the other dog,
and then attack.
NOTE TO THE VIDEOS
Each of the videos contained in this ethogram has been
carefully analysed, and is accompanied by a description
of the behaviours displayed. Note that the behaviours
highlighted are not the entire list of those observed,
but rather the most important ones. I have purposefully
omitted any type of interpretation, limiting my comments
to a descriptive analysis, given that a clip of just a
few seconds taken out of the context of a longer
interaction is not enough to allow the viewer of the
video to interpret the events seen.
PART ONE
Introduction
PART TWO
Aggressiveness
PART THREE
Ethogram of Agonistic Behaviours
A
- B - C
- D -F
- G - H
- I - J
- L - M
- N - O
- P - R
- S - T
- W
start
- contents - authors
- bibliography - books
& DVD
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