Although owners can act as stress buffers for their dogs, whether dogs with poor early life histories with humans will respond similarly is unknown. We tested 45 dogs, 23 of which were rescued from adverse conditions, in a social paradigm in which a threatening stranger confronted them with either their owner or an unfamiliar human present. Salivary cortisol levels were assessed at three points, and the dogs' behavior and owners' responses to questionnaires were evaluated. Dogs from adverse backgrounds engaged in greater contact and exhibited more relaxed behaviors and social referencing when their owners were present. Dogs from the comparison group explored more when accompanied by their owners. Dogs from adverse backgrounds experienced greater decreases in cortisol levels from the first to third samples relative to dogs in the comparison group. Dogs from adverse backgrounds were also more likely to respond fearfully to a threatening stranger. Their owners rated them as having higher levels of stranger-directed fear, nonsocial fear, separation-related problems, attention seeking, and lower levels of chasing and trainability. These findings from this study suggest that early adverse environments may have lasting effects on dogs' social behavior.

中文翻译：

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在社会压力缓冲范式中，狗的早期生活逆境会产生改变的生理和行为反应

尽管主人可以为他们的狗充当压力缓冲器，但早期与人类生活史不佳的狗是否会做出类似的反应尚不清楚。我们测试了 45 只狗，其中 23 只是从不利条件下获救的，在一种社会范式中，威胁性的陌生人与它们的主人或不熟悉的人类在场对峙。在三个点评估唾液皮质醇水平，并评估狗的行为和主人对问卷的反应。当主人在场时，来自不利背景的狗会进行更多的接触，并表现出更轻松的行为和社会参照。对照组的狗在主人的陪伴下探索得更多。相对于对照组的狗，来自不良背景的狗从第一个样本到第三个样本的皮质醇水平下降幅度更大。来自不良背景的狗也更有可能对威胁性的陌生人做出恐惧的反应。它们的主人认为它们对陌生人的恐惧、非社交恐惧、分离相关问题、寻求关注的程度较高，而追逐和可训练性较低。这项研究的结果表明，早期的不利环境可能会对狗的社会行为产生持久的影响。