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</o:shapelayout></xml><![endif]--></head><body lang=EN-US link=blue vlink=purple><div class=WordSection1><p class=MsoNormal>Parenting Style Matters When It Comes To Raising A Guide Dog <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>Shots - Health News : NPR<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>Coddled Puppies Make Poor Guide Dogs, Study Suggests<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><a href="http://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2017/08/07/541644280/coddled-puppies-make-poor-guide-dogs-study-suggests">http://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2017/08/07/541644280/coddled-puppies-make-poor-guide-dogs-study-suggests</a><o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>August 7, 20173:44 PM ET <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal> Heard on <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>All Things Considered<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>Rebecca Hersher <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>New research found a link between how puppies interact with their mothers and how they perform in guide dog training. <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>Well-trained guide dogs are important for visually impaired people who rely on them. But many puppies bred to be guide dogs flunk out of training programs.<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>A <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>study<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences suggests the way a puppy's mother raises it may be the key to the dog's success,<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>or failure. A research team at the University of Pennsylvania found that puppies destined for guide dog training are more likely to fail if they're coddled<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>by their mothers. <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>"Surprisingly, there's not a lot of research about mothering behavior in dogs," says lead author <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>Emily Bray. <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>Past studies on rodents and primates have found that, in general, active mothering is better than no mothering. "So, on one hand, we'd think 'Yes, you<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>need your mother. Mothering should be a good thing.' But for guide dogs, the mothers are with their puppies in the pen 24/7. So then the question becomes<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>'What exactly is beneficial?' " <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>The answer, at least for guide dogs, appears to be what Bray describes as a hands-off style. (Or, paws-off style?) <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>"Basically the puppies are kept in a kiddie pool lined with towels. So the hands-off mothers are the ones that are spending less time [in the pool] with<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>their puppies and not interacting with them as much," explains Bray. "Whereas a hands-on mother is going to be constantly in the pool, licking them, grooming<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>them, interacting with them." <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>They found that among the 98 puppies they studied, the actively-mothered ones were more likely to fail a guide dog training program later. <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>How mothers nurse their puppies also affected how puppies performed. The mothers will either lie down to nurse, or sit or stand up. If the mother dog is<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>sitting or standing, "she's further from the puppy. The puppy has to work for it," explains Bray. "Those puppies are more successful [later] as guide dogs."<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>A mother dog sits while she nurses her puppies. <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>Credit: Courtesy of The Seeing Eye <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>A mother dog lies down while she nurses her puppies. <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>Credit: Courtesy of The Seeing Eye <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>The training for guide dogs teaches and selects for a very specific set of skills. "You're looking for dogs that are very compliant, very, very relaxed,<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>not at all thrown off by any kind of strange occurrences," says <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>Clive Wynne,<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>a professor of psychology at Arizona State University and a dog cognition specialist. "These dogs need to remain calm under all circumstances." <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>The dogs also need to be "sufficiently driven to learn and tackle tasks," says Bray, and capable of limited disobedience in order to, for example, disobey<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>a command that would put their handler in danger. <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>Bray thinks that one reason hands-off mothering is associated with more of these traits could be that the little challenges in puppyhood prepare them for<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>the bigger challenges of being a guide dog. "It's good for the puppies to have these small challenges to overcome, like not having the mother around, rather<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>than having the mom there, around, all the time, not letting them experience things on their own," she hypothesizes. <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>Another possibility is that maternal stress could affect puppy development. Previous research has found higher levels of the stress-related hormone cortisol<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>in dogs with more active parenting behaviors. <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>Still another possibility is that specific mothering behaviors may not be the primary cause of the observations. It may be more about genetics. The authors<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>point out that high-performing guide dogs are chosen to breed. Puppies raised by rock star guide dogs may go on to perform well in guide dog training because<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>they are genetically predisposed to success, not because their mothers were hands-off. In order to test that possibility, they would have needed to swap<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>out litters, so one mother was taking care of another's puppies. <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>Wynne, who was not involved with the research, thinks the findings shouldn't be applied broadly, even to other working dogs. "I think what we have here<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>is a special effect of working with guide dog populations, and not necessarily true of all dogs or all animals," he says. Two previous studies on <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>military working dogs<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>and <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>other dogs<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>have found the opposite effect: that more anxious mothers produce more successful offspring in those contexts. <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>But, Wynne says, the potential specificity of the results does not undercut the usefulness of the research. "At a completely practical level, there's always<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>a problem finding enough guide dogs for people who need guide dogs," he says, and "it's always difficult getting dogs through those kinds of programs."<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>He thinks research like this might help increase the effectiveness and efficiency of training. "So, it's very powerful and useful," he says.<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal style='text-autospace:none'><span style='font-family:"Courier New"'>Experience is not what happens to you; it's what you do with what happens to you.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal style='text-autospace:none'><span style='font-family:"Courier New"'>Aldous Huxley<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>-- <br>The Seeing Eye<br>Independence with Dignity since 1929<br><br> <br>If you need to contact one of the list owners for <br>> questions or assistance, please use the following email address: <a href="mailto:seeing-eye+owner@googlegroups.com">seeing-eye+owner@googlegroups.com</a>.<br>--- <br>You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Seeing Eye Discussions" group.<br>To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to <a href="mailto:seeing-eye+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com">seeing-eye+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com</a>.<br>To post to this group, send email to <a href="mailto:seeing-eye@googlegroups.com">seeing-eye@googlegroups.com</a>.<br>To view this discussion on the web visit <a href="https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/seeing-eye/000601d3106d%246cebaaa0%2446c2ffe0%24%40embarqmail.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer">https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/seeing-eye/000601d3106d%246cebaaa0%2446c2ffe0%24%40embarqmail.com</a>.<br>For more options, visit <a href="https://groups.google.com/d/optout">https://groups.google.com/d/optout</a>.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>-- <br>The Seeing Eye<br>Independence with Dignity since 1929<br><br> <br>If you need to contact one of the list owners for <br>> questions or assistance, please use the following email address: <a href="mailto:seeing-eye+owner@googlegroups.com">seeing-eye+owner@googlegroups.com</a>.<br>--- <br>You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Seeing Eye Discussions" group.<br>To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to <a href="mailto:seeing-eye+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com">seeing-eye+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com</a>.<br>To post to this group, send email to <a href="mailto:seeing-eye@googlegroups.com">seeing-eye@googlegroups.com</a>.<br>To view this discussion on the web visit <a href="https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/seeing-eye/006501d31138%2455c1a070%240144e150%24%40ky2d.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer">https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/seeing-eye/006501d31138%2455c1a070%240144e150%24%40ky2d.com</a>.<br>For more options, visit <a href="https://groups.google.com/d/optout">https://groups.google.com/d/optout</a>.<o:p></o:p></span></p></div></body></html>