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Description

The existence and stability of breed-specific cognitive and behavioural profiles remain a topic of ongoing debate. It is not yet clear whether the observed behavioural differences between dog breeds persist consistently over time, and whether the ability to maintain performance on a previously learned behaviour potentially confers differential advantages across breed clades. Using a structured hand-touch learning task, discrimination and reversal learning performance, along with perseverance, and emotionality were assessed in 105 dogs from four breed clades across two testing occasions, while controlling for reward responsiveness, demographic factors, and relevant training history. Perseverance appeared to be a relatively stable trait, whereas discrimination and reversal learning performance seemed to improve across time. The extent of change in performance varied across breed clades, suggesting that breed-specific cognitive profiles may shape behavioural and learning dynamics over time. Initial differences across breed clades in the reversal learning performance were not maintained upon re-exposure to the task, likely due to increased individual variability. In contrast, differences across breed clades in the discrimination learning performance emerged only in the second testing occasion. Thus, depending on the cognitive capacity being assessed, repeated exposure may either obscure or facilitate the expression of underlying breed-specific performance patterns. Furthermore, although the average emotionality decreased, emotionality changes did not consistently align with breed clades’ performance improvement, which may suggest a potential dissociation between cognitive performance and emotional reactivity in some breed clades. Where each breed falls within the cognitive stability-flexibility continuum requires further investigation.