0000000000138167

AUTHOR

Outi Vainio

Time-resolved classification of dog brain signals reveals early processing of faces, species and emotion

Dogs process faces and emotional expressions much like humans, but the time windows important for face processing in dogs are largely unknown. By combining our non-invasive electroencephalography (EEG) protocol on dogs with machine-learning algorithms, we show category-specific dog brain responses to pictures of human and dog facial expressions, objects, and phase-scrambled faces. We trained a support vector machine classifier with spatiotemporal EEG data to discriminate between responses to pairs of images. The classification accuracy was highest for humans or dogs vs. scrambled images, with most informative time intervals of 100–140 ms and 240–280 ms. We also detected a response sensitive…

research product

Observing animals and humans : dogs target their gaze to the biological information in natural scenes

Background This study examines how dogs observe images of natural scenes containing living creatures (wild animals, dogs and humans) recorded with eye gaze tracking. Because dogs have had limited exposure to wild animals in their lives, we also consider the natural novelty of the wild animal images for the dogs. Methods The eye gaze of dogs was recorded while they viewed natural images containing dogs, humans, and wild animals. Three categories of images were used: naturalistic landscape images containing single humans or animals, full body images containing a single human or an animal, and full body images containing a pair of humans or animals. The gazing behavior of two dog populations,…

research product

Dog behaviour classification with movement sensors placed on the harness and the collar

Dog owners’ understanding of the daily behaviour of their dogs may be enhanced by movement measurements that can detect repeatable dog behaviour, such as levels of daily activity and rest as well as their changes. The aim of this study was to evaluate the performance of supervised machine learning methods utilising accelerometer and gyroscope data provided by wearable movement sensors in classification of seven typical dog activities in a semi-controlled test situation. Forty-five middle to large sized dogs participated in the study. Two sensor devices were attached to each dog, one on the back of the dog in a harness and one on the neck collar. Altogether 54 features were extracted from th…

research product

Dog-Owner Relationship, Owner Interpretations and Dog Personality Are Connected with the Emotional Reactivity of Dogs

Simple Summary The relationship between owner and the dog affects the dog's attachment behaviors and stress coping. In turn, the quality of the relationship may affect owner's interpretations about their dog's behavior. Here, we assessed dogs' emotional responses from heart rate variability and behavioral changes during five different situations. Dog owners evaluated the emotion (valence and arousal) of their dog after each situation. We found that both negative and positive incidents provoked signs of emotional arousal in dogs. Owners detected the dog's arousal especially during fear- and stress-evoking situations. The dog-owner relationship did not affect owners' interpretation of dogs' e…

research product

Description of movement sensor dataset for dog behavior classification

The description and results of the original investigation are found in: Dog behaviour classification with movement sensors placed on the harness and the collar, Kumpulainen, P., Valldeoriola Cardó, A., Somppi, S., Törnqvist, H., Väätäjä, H., Majaranta, P., Gizatdinova, Y., Antink, C. H., Surakka, V., V. Kujala, M., Vainio, O. & Vehkaoja, A., Aug 2021, In: Applied Animal Behaviour Science. 241, 7 p., 105393. Movement sensor data from seven static and dynamic dog behaviors (sitting, standing, lying down, trotting, walking, playing, and (treat) searching i.e. sniffing) was collected from 45 middle to large sized dogs with six degree-of-freedom movement sensors attached to the collar and the ha…

research product

New national and regional biological records for Finland 11 : Contributions to Bryophyta and Marchantiophyta 10

Ten species of mosses (Bryophyta: Entosthodon obtusus, Entosthodon ulvinenii, Eurhynchiastrum diversifolium, Hedwigia emodica, Hedwigia mollis, Hygrohypnum styriacum, Plagiothecium rossicum, Polytrichum perigoniale, Tortella alpicola and Ulota intermedia) are presented as new for Finland. Cephalozia lacinulata, previously considered to be regionally extinct from Finland, is reported to being found again. New records in biogeographical provinces for 67 species of mosses and 34 species of liverworts are listed. Finally, 6 occurrences in provinces are removed due to misidentifications or missing specimens. peerReviewed

research product