Replication Data for: Fundamental Learning Differences Across Five Dog Breed Clades: Breed-specific Predispositions, Individual Experiences, or a Fusion of Both?|犬类学习数据集|品种差异数据集

Learning is crucial for shaping domestic dogs’ behaviour through life experiences, yet not all breeds exhibit the same learning aptitude towards a particular task. The current study's objective was to identify differences in fundamental learning features across and within five breed clades and elucidate the underlying factors contributing into these differences. Dogs (N=111) from five different breed clades (UK Rural, Retrievers, Asian Spitz, European Mastiff, and New World) participated in a virtual learning task with their owners. Owners completed validated questionnaires of Impulsivity and Reward Responsiveness. The learning task comprised of reinforcing an arbitrary behaviour (hand-touch) through multiple sessions of Acquisition (reinforcing the hand-touch), Discrimination (reinforcing the hand-touch on one of two hands) and Reversal Learning (reinforcing the hand-touch on the opposite hand), followed by a single session of Extinction (hand-touch not reinforced). Results showed notable differences across the studied breed clades in certain learning components. However, these disparities may not solely stem from inherent cognitive variations among breeds but rather potentially influenced by contextual factors such as the human-dog communication dynamics attributed to breeds’ cooperativity. Furthermore, breed clades differed in the contributing factors predicting individual learning performances, which also highlights the potential effect of breeds’ historical function.