For several reasons the idea of using certain medical problems in the domestic, primarily companion, dog as a model for similar problems in humans is generating interest among some involved with the One Health Initiative, a program in which veterinarians and physicians share information for the benefit of all species.
Before reading on, think about that. Does it strike you as odd that dogs would be better models for certain human medical problems than mice, rats, or even nonhuman primates or computer programs?
In general, people greet this news with one of two responses. Some believe that parallels between certain human and canine diseases are so obvious that they can’t believe that this approach hasn’t been considered before. But others immediately imagine scientists performing all kinds of horrible experiments on their canine best friends. Because the latter elicits such troubling images, let’s address it first.
As mentioned, the One Health Initiative was created to enable veterinarians and physicians to share information more easily. Relative to all those medical conditions common to humans and dogs, years of canine data already exists in veterinary teaching hospitals and other facilities worldwide. Not only that, this represents the best kind of data. In addition to that which results from carefully designed and controlled research on various aspects of these diseases, there’s also clinical data that reveals how these diseases manifest and respond to different treatments in dogs living in a wide variety of complex real-world settings. So we’re not talking about turning dogs into lab rats for the betterment of the human species. We’re talking about sharing already existing medical data on human and canine (and other animal) problems for the benefit of all species.
That said, here’s an example of research on an untreatable spontaneous spinal condition that occurs in dogs that mimics a similar condition found in humans more closely than it’s possible to reproduce in an artificial laboratory setting. Treatments that help these dogs also may help people.
For those who consider the similarities in canine and human medical conditions so obvious as not to merit mention, nonetheless this is a relatively new idea within the medical community. It wasn’t that long ago that veterinarians and physicians who admitted such a belief would be accused and convicted of the sin of anthropomorphism quicker than you could say Dr. Doolittle. But as the number of diseases shared by and transmitted between animals and humans increases, the cost of such a limited view increasingly outweighs its benefits.
For the most part, though, so far this broadening of view has been pretty much limited to medical problems. But what about behavioral and bond ones? That thought occurred to me as I read an article in the January/February 2014 Scientific American Mind magazine entitled “ADHA Grows Up”. According to the authors, early signs of what later will be diagnosed as Adult Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder often are missed in children. This occurs because some parents, teachers, and other adults constantly do things for these children or coax them to do those things the children must do for themselves, such as homework and certain chores. When these children grow up and go to college or enter the workforce and lose this support group, the resulting impulsiveness this approach fosters leads to short-term interests and rewards taking precedence over any long-term goals. And that can get them into trouble. While medication may help some of these people focus, all of them need to learn the skills necessary to survive and thrive as adults.
Becoming overwhelmed by responsibilities upon reaching adulthood also occurs in dogs. And it results in impulsiveness that manifests as aggression or destructive behaviors that may be further complicated by stress-related medical problems. Like some of those folks with adult ADHD, a fair number of these dogs never learned self-control and self-reinforcement when they were young because they were surrounded by reactive people who micromanaged their lives and relied upon rewards to reinforce canine behaviors. As a result, they wound up with dogs who could focus if it suited the dog’s purpose. If not, all bets were off.
One major difference between humans and dogs is societal expectations and the physiological and behavioral wherewithal to fulfill them. As they get older, most children do figure out that society expects them to assume the responsibilities of adulthood when they reach adulthood, whether any adults in their lives prepared them to do this or not. These include becoming more self-reliant and ultimately self-supporting. However the physiological and behavioral changes associated with domestication prepared dogs to remain dependent on humans their entire lives.
At this point you reasonably could be thinking that highly reactive, high-reward relationships with pre-adult dogs therefore should foster exactly that kind of connection. Unfortunately such may not be the case because of a critical difference in human and canine parental strategies. To understand how this works, let’s look at it in ethological terms.
All wild canines alive today owe their existence to the successful survival strategies that evolved among their ancient ancestors. Among these, parental strategies play a key role. Not only do these address what goes on between adult and offspring in the here and now, they also address preparing the young for those times when they’ll be on their own without parental or other adult guidance. Consequently, those young animals most likely to survive are those whose interactions with adults have taught them self-reinforcement and self-control.
The first step toward this may seem counter-intuitive: once the pups become active, it becomes their responsibility to follow and react to the adult’s behavior, not vice versa. This is necessary because dogs normally give birth to litters. Any adult dog who tried to gain the attention of multiple pups and individually convince them to follow because the adult noticed a predator wouldn’t be long for this world. And neither would those pups.
The same logistical problem makes using modeling as the primary teaching method the most energy-efficient and effective choice. Compare adults demonstrating the proper response to their offspring under a variety of everyday real-world circumstances versus lining them up, teaching commands, and using rewards to coax them to obey. Which approach takes the most energy and time? Which one sets up the young to make choices and learn to deal with the consequences of those choices? Which one best prepares them to develop self-control and self-confidence under the widest range of circumstances?
But wild dogs aren’t domestic companion dogs. Unlike wild dogs, domestic dog physiology and behavior didn’t prepare them to grow up and assume responsibility in an adult human world as we expect human offspring to do. We even relieve domestic dogs of their reproductive organs in the belief that doing so will make it easier for them to ignore any temptation to act like fully mature and capable animals. The bad news is that when we engage in reactive other-reinforcement-based strategies that create problems for some kids in later life, we may create problems for some dogs when they grow up too. This occurs because in domestic dogs those strategies result in human-canine role reversal. By constantly reacting to the puppy instead of expecting the puppy to follow our example, we inadvertently (but maybe sometimes deliberately) communicate that we expect the animal to take care of us. In human behavioral terms, this is comparable to asking a child to run the household and keep everyone in it safe from all harm and danger.
What happens next depends of whether the dog possesses the wherewithal to assume the responsibilities that go with that position in the animal’s particular environment. If the dog does, no problems arise. If not, then the negative stress associated with this may trigger a rogue’s gallery of canine behavioral problems and/or open the door to stress-related medical ones. The most challenging situations arise when dogs who lack the ability to assume this elevated position belong to people who lack the self-control, self-confidence, or desire to assume it themselves.
It’s interesting to me that comparable adult responses to children and dogs may create problems for both. If we opt for an over-reactive cajoling approach with kids, we risk delaying their maturity and their ability to succeed as adults. If we take that same approach with dogs who physiologically and behaviorally evolved to expect us to act like grown-ups, we may force them to assume adult responsibilities beyond their abilities which are equally problematic for them. Same approach, different results.
In my mind this realization further supports the notion that taking an interspecific approach to behavioral as well as medical problems in humans and animals could offer new insights into prevention. But in the meantime, it seems wise to guard against the temptation to boast that we treat the dog like one of the kids.
That only works if we master the parental and teaching skills appropriate for both.
If you have any comments regarding subject matter, favorite links, or anything you’d like to see discussed on or added to this site, please let me know at mm@mmilani.com.
For several reasons the idea of using certain medical problems in the domestic, primarily companion, dog as a model for similar problems in humans is generating interest among some involved with the One Health Initiative, a program in which veterinarians and physicians share information for the benefit of all species.
Before reading on, think about that. Does it strike you as odd that dogs would be better models for certain human medical problems than mice, rats, or even nonhuman primates or computer programs?
In general, people greet this news with one of two responses. Some believe that parallels between certain human and canine diseases are so obvious that they can’t believe that this approach hasn’t been considered before. But others immediately imagine scientists performing all kinds of horrible experiments on their canine best friends. Because the latter elicits such troubling images, let’s address it first.
As mentioned, the One Health Initiative was created to enable veterinarians and physicians to share information more easily. Relative to all those medical conditions common to humans and dogs, years of canine data already exists in veterinary teaching hospitals and other facilities worldwide. Not only that, this represents the best kind of data. In addition to that which results from carefully designed and controlled research on various aspects of these diseases, there’s also clinical data that reveals how these diseases manifest and respond to different treatments in dogs living in a wide variety of complex real-world settings. So we’re not talking about turning dogs into lab rats for the betterment of the human species. We’re talking about sharing already existing medical data on human and canine (and other animal) problems for the benefit of all species.
That said, here’s an example of research on an untreatable spontaneous spinal condition that occurs in dogs that mimics a similar condition found in humans more closely than it’s possible to reproduce in an artificial laboratory setting. Treatments that help these dogs also may help people.
For those who consider the similarities in canine and human medical conditions so obvious as not to merit mention, nonetheless this is a relatively new idea within the medical community. It wasn’t that long ago that veterinarians and physicians who admitted such a belief would be accused and convicted of the sin of anthropomorphism quicker than you could say Dr. Doolittle. But as the number of diseases shared by and transmitted between animals and humans increases, the cost of such a limited view increasingly outweighs its benefits.
For the most part, though, so far this broadening of view has been pretty much limited to medical problems. But what about behavioral and bond ones? That thought occurred to me as I read an article in the January/February 2014 Scientific American Mind magazine entitled “ADHA Grows Up”. According to the authors, early signs of what later will be diagnosed as Adult Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder often are missed in children. This occurs because some parents, teachers, and other adults constantly do things for these children or coax them to do those things the children must do for themselves, such as homework and certain chores. When these children grow up and go to college or enter the workforce and lose this support group, the resulting impulsiveness this approach fosters leads to short-term interests and rewards taking precedence over any long-term goals. And that can get them into trouble. While medication may help some of these people focus, all of them need to learn the skills necessary to survive and thrive as adults.
Becoming overwhelmed by responsibilities upon reaching adulthood also occurs in dogs. And it results in impulsiveness that manifests as aggression or destructive behaviors that may be further complicated by stress-related medical problems. Like some of those folks with adult ADHD, a fair number of these dogs never learned self-control and self-reinforcement when they were young because they were surrounded by reactive people who micromanaged their lives and relied upon rewards to reinforce canine behaviors. As a result, they wound up with dogs who could focus if it suited the dog’s purpose. If not, all bets were off.
One major difference between humans and dogs is societal expectations and the physiological and behavioral wherewithal to fulfill them. As they get older, most children do figure out that society expects them to assume the responsibilities of adulthood when they reach adulthood, whether any adults in their lives prepared them to do this or not. These include becoming more self-reliant and ultimately self-supporting. However the physiological and behavioral changes associated with domestication prepared dogs to remain dependent on humans their entire lives.
At this point you reasonably could be thinking that highly reactive, high-reward relationships with pre-adult dogs therefore should foster exactly that kind of connection. Unfortunately such may not be the case because of a critical difference in human and canine parental strategies. To understand how this works, let’s look at it in ethological terms.
All wild canines alive today owe their existence to the successful survival strategies that evolved among their ancient ancestors. Among these, parental strategies play a key role. Not only do these address what goes on between adult and offspring in the here and now, they also address preparing the young for those times when they’ll be on their own without parental or other adult guidance. Consequently, those young animals most likely to survive are those whose interactions with adults have taught them self-reinforcement and self-control.
The first step toward this may seem counter-intuitive: once the pups become active, it becomes their responsibility to follow and react to the adult’s behavior, not vice versa. This is necessary because dogs normally give birth to litters. Any adult dog who tried to gain the attention of multiple pups and individually convince them to follow because the adult noticed a predator wouldn’t be long for this world. And neither would those pups.
The same logistical problem makes using modeling as the primary teaching method the most energy-efficient and effective choice. Compare adults demonstrating the proper response to their offspring under a variety of everyday real-world circumstances versus lining them up, teaching commands, and using rewards to coax them to obey. Which approach takes the most energy and time? Which one sets up the young to make choices and learn to deal with the consequences of those choices? Which one best prepares them to develop self-control and self-confidence under the widest range of circumstances?
But wild dogs aren’t domestic companion dogs. Unlike wild dogs, domestic dog physiology and behavior didn’t prepare them to grow up and assume responsibility in an adult human world as we expect human offspring to do. We even relieve domestic dogs of their reproductive organs in the belief that doing so will make it easier for them to ignore any temptation to act like fully mature and capable animals. The bad news is that when we engage in reactive other-reinforcement-based strategies that create problems for some kids in later life, we may create problems for some dogs when they grow up too. This occurs because in domestic dogs those strategies result in human-canine role reversal. By constantly reacting to the puppy instead of expecting the puppy to follow our example, we inadvertently (but maybe sometimes deliberately) communicate that we expect the animal to take care of us. In human behavioral terms, this is comparable to asking a child to run the household and keep everyone in it safe from all harm and danger.
What happens next depends of whether the dog possesses the wherewithal to assume the responsibilities that go with that position in the animal’s particular environment. If the dog does, no problems arise. If not, then the negative stress associated with this may trigger a rogue’s gallery of canine behavioral problems and/or open the door to stress-related medical ones. The most challenging situations arise when dogs who lack the ability to assume this elevated position belong to people who lack the self-control, self-confidence, or desire to assume it themselves.
It’s interesting to me that comparable adult responses to children and dogs may create problems for both. If we opt for an over-reactive cajoling approach with kids, we risk delaying their maturity and their ability to succeed as adults. If we take that same approach with dogs who physiologically and behaviorally evolved to expect us to act like grown-ups, we may force them to assume adult responsibilities beyond their abilities which are equally problematic for them. Same approach, different results.
In my mind this realization further supports the notion that taking an interspecific approach to behavioral as well as medical problems in humans and animals could offer new insights into prevention. But in the meantime, it seems wise to guard against the temptation to boast that we treat the dog like one of the kids.
That only works if we master the parental and teaching skills appropriate for both.
If you have any comments regarding subject matter, favorite links, or anything you’d like to see discussed on or added to this site, please let me know at mm@mmilani.com.