Science Buddies: "Ask an Expert"

Hello,
I am planning on conducting an experiment having to do with dog behavior. I noticed that male dogs tend to grow aggressive when in the presence of a male human. I wondered why and began to research but I wasn't able to find any previous experimentation done on this topic. Do you have any suggestions?

thanks

Hi- Dogs in general are a very heterogeneous group. If this is just an anecdotal observation, you may find that this does not hold up upon investigation. Different breeds react very differently to similar situations. What you would first have to do is get a couple of sample sets of dogs that are the same breed, sex and age (puppies and senior dogs will act differently than adults) and a sample set of humans, males and females. I would start with traditionally aggressive breeds and traditionally docile breeds. Then you would have to mix all the dogs and humans equally and put them in similar play situations and measure whether the male dogs get aggressive around males more than females. Of course this whole experiment is very risky because you're dealing with animals and you will have get special permissions to do all of this. You may be surprised by the results.

Lauren,
Hi! You might want to do a search on canine passive/active dominance. Clive Dalton, author of books on animal behavior found that

Sex differences in behavior studies have shown that behaviour is affected by the sex of the dog and the sex of the owner. In kennel situations, female dogs show no sex preferences but male dogs were most likely to avoid body contact with men. Studies showed that male dogs were more active and more aggressive when with other dogs, and they were more dominant over their owners and showed more territorial defence than females. Males showed more aggression than neutered dogs with females showing least aggression. Males were most likely to show destructive behaviour and separation anxiety.

I hope this helps!