Your dog’s breed doesn’t determine its personality, study suggests

A new study shows that almost none of the behaviors we associate with dog breeds—from lovable Labradors to pugnacious pit bulls—are hard-wired. Aside from a few ancient traits, environment seems to play a much larger role than pedigree.

[jimjam]

The reason why people think that breed is such a strong term meaning of behavior is because of something known as confirmation bias. You already believed that the golden retriever is going to behave a certain way so you ignore evidence to the contrary and only remember the evidence that confirms your belief.

People are also failing to understand that the working behavior of herding or retrieving are going to be the few behaviors that are more breed-specific.

What isn't breed-specific is sociability

[kxyoto]

Funny how individual dog owners on here are acting like they know better than the science. When the science in this study isn't claiming to be the end all be all. It's challenging preconceptions and opening up for this to be studied further. Which is what science is supposed to do.

[HebaruSan]

Probably missed a lot by excluding trained behaviors as per 0:55. You could try to train a golden retriever to do herding, but they'll never take to it like a border collie does.

[Berkana]

It might not determine it, but it sure feels like it influences the probability distribution of various traits. If domestication can influence the personality of wolves, turning them from high stress, low-trust, snarling beasts, to low-stress high-strust cuddly fluff balls, I can't imagine breeding can't influence traits among dogs. This headline is so contrary to the common experience of dog owners that I suspect something is amiss.

[lohphat]

I have yet to meet a yappy golden retriever, lethargic boxer, or lazy Australian shepherd.

Domestic breeds are man-made for purpose, and with those breeding programs come personality traits just as much as physiological traits.

[FearlessPP]

I find that hard to believe. They must define personality in a certain way perhaps in a narrow way. There’s always some truth in stereotypes. Like golden retrievers or those “working dogs” having a lot of energy seems true for me. I assume the size of the dog should affect how they see the world. Like if they’re small theyre more scared easily since every other thing is larger than it? While a larger dog is more “confident”, if you will.

[monkeymanwasd]

Personality is largely genetically inheritable though so its more of am issue of what personality dogs were bred to have

[ninjasaurusrexatron]

perhaps sampling bias? you're only hearing from people who care enough about their dogs to answer hour long questionnaires about them. that is not the average dog owner.

[XavierKatzone]

PC BS. Having had five dogs of the same cattle herding/dingo breed, I've found that while they are certainly all individuals, they have more behaviors in common with themselves and others of their breed than they do with other breeds. Breeds that were developed for SPECIFIC PERFORMANCE TRAITS may be more prone to exhibit behavior commonality than those breed on appearance and conformation (the curse of show-dog breeding!).
Seems your intent may be more oriented towards pushing a parallel anthropomorphic AGENDA.

[footfault]

Phenotypic plasticity. Artificial selection might have weighed in to varied degrees, which resulted in discernible trends in each race, but personality is another matter. Scientifically proved. Fine!

[mazi_thoughts]

Next they’ll say “Dog breeds don’t determine looks.”

[NajwaLaylah]

None of this explains why my McNab shepherdCTerrier didn't need to be trained to round up and herd ducks.

[XavierKatzone]

Another issue here is who or whar were they raised by, and how. Wolves not raised by other experienced wolves in a functioning pack pick up aberrant behaviors and will never fit in as a member of ANY functional wild pack.
I have a lot of concerns and questions about the method, veracity, and hypothesis / intent of this study, which seems to ignore the sublimations and shaping of canine prey-drive (i.e. "the breed was developed quickly by a merciless culling of the litters") over many, many generations that has led to the specific development of an ingrained set of key behaviors and anatomical traits in working, hunting, protection, and other dog breeds.
I certainly hope you're not pushing contemporary "agendas" by postulatung a broad multi-species application of your findings.

[footfault]

The subject presented is easily misunderstood or misinterpreted. Not all dog owners are trained for or familiar with rigorously scientific protocol. Interesting, but bits mishandled?

[Jiasongli-bx]

Cats wanna the same project as dogs'.

[julieveggie]

Breed traits = behavior not necessarily personality.A controversial article about the innate character of dogs is currently making the rounds on media and social media. I read the article. I haven't studied it in close detail, but the gist of the argument was fairly straightforward: pedigree breed is a poor predictor (or "uninformative, " as the authors put) of the expected behavior of any given dog. Dogs are individuals through and through. There is no necessary connection between the dog's breed and its everyday behavior.This will be news to generations of dog breeders.The study is flawed in a number of ways. Most importantly, data sets are drawn from owner surveys. It goes without saying that asking people to talk about their dog is hardly a testament to scientific objectivity. An owner survey would be an interesting instrument for getting at folk wisdom or popular beliefs about dogs. But it's nearly useless for genuine scientific purposes. A good number of lay people think that dogs are more or less people dressed up in fur. I wouldn't rely on people who think like that for any kind of insight into the canine psyche and its expression in behavior. As far as I can tell, the study proceeds on a simple fallacy. It assumes that because dogs are individual in personality, they must also be individual in behavior. The latter clearly does not follow from the former. Every dog will plant its nose squarely in a deposit of canine urine, no matter whether the dog is bold or timid. All dogs are compelled to smell urine markings by their genetics. They have no choice in the matter. They do it without ever thinking about it. This doesn't mean that a dog is nothing but a genetic machine. But it does mean that compared to humans dogs have a relatively restricted realm of personal freedom. Heredity decides for dogs in a way that it does not decide for us. Both human and dog are creatures of education (or "training"). But the human is infinitely more plastic. Dogs can learn a lot of things, but there are also skills and ways of being that are beyond their capacity. Once again, their genome restricts their powers. Dogs will never talk and they will never write poetry. Such abilities are just not in them.If the dog's genome imposes clear cognitive and physical limits then it's ludicrous to propose that the breed of the dog is not decisive in certain respects. The breed is integral (not incidental) to the dog's genome. In other words, a German Shepherd is not first a dog and then secondly a German Shepherd. A German Shepherd is a dog's genome conformed to a German Shepherd. If you took away the breed traits of the German Shepherd from an individual German Shepherd you wouldn't be left with a generic all-purpose dog. You wouldn't be left with anything at all. The generic all-purpose dog in this context is an abstraction, a concept. It's not something that one might empirically see. In short, breeds are real and irreducible. But this has always been known. Simply because it's obvious! The "scientific" assault on the notion of breed (which plays to the notion of the abstracted generic dog) is really of a piece with ideology. The downgrading of breed serves as a cudgel against the argument for Breed Specific Legislation (BSL). Particularly, laws and regulations that target the pit bull breeds. We are supposed to believe that every pit bull is an individual and must be judged as such. As I noted above, yes, every pit bull is an individual, but for purposes of public safety these dogs can be considered in a general light. Indeed, given their record of violence (mauling and killing people) it makes sense to look at pit bulls as a whole as a real category of threat as opposed to waiting (after the fact of an attack) to see which pit bulls in particular are dangerous. The latter strategy is poor risk management. Letting the dog disfigure or kill someone before you sanction it is hardly consonant with public safety. It makes more sense to anticipate danger than to deal with danger after it has already manifested itself. In other words, regulate that the bridge must be upkept before it collapses. It's exactly the same with pit bulls: they should be banned so they never have a chance to hurt or kill someone. That's the real value of BSL.

[Sanctanoxjas]

Study finds this study wrong, study performed by anyone who has ever owned a boxer, a staff, a whippet or a dog.. any dog.. the little aggressive wowas, the laid back wolfhounds, dumb video

[martinmartins]

Wow. These researches are either really bad at researching or think anyone watching/reading that has spent time with many different dog breeds is incapable of simple pattern recognition.

[NeonCicada]

What about pugs and siberian huskies? 🤔
I think they both have fairly unique personalities and little mannerisms which are specific to their breeds.
Huskies are known for throwing dramatic tantrums and vocalising -- and pugs...well, they've certainly earned themselves quite the reputations for being clingy little comedians. I will say that pug ownership has been less like having a dog and more like a small child.

The amount of quirky little behaviours that are common in those breeds makes me think it must be (at least partially) the result of selective breeding. 😮

[builder_dahomey]

A dog is a dog. I think what determines personality is the treatment of an animal.