# Help with college behaviour assignment please!



## Woodysausage (Oct 9, 2010)

Ok, I'm investigating 4 types of abnormal behaviours - Stereotypic, learned helplessness, inactivity and hyperactivity. I have to choose 2 for a domestic animal (obviously I've chosen cats!) and 2 for a captive species. I can come up with quite a few for stereotypic behaviours (overgrooming, spraying, weeing in the wrong place-grrrrr!) but I'm having trouble thinking of any others. Can anybody make any suggestions? 

Any advice on this would be greatly appreciated! 

Thank you.


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## Atlantys (Aug 24, 2010)

Off the top of my head (ie: don't really have time to think about it now) I would say that learned helplessness is something most demonstrable in 'captive species' rather than pets. 

Think of the tests they have done on rats and dogs where they give them repeated electric shocks that they can't escape from. They give up and allow themselves to be shocked without resistance (learned helplessness), and then, even if given the opportunity to escape later, they don't even try.


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## Colette (Jan 2, 2010)

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but think you have misunderstood the concept of stereotypic behaviours. Not all unwanted behaviours are stereotypic.

Overgrooming may well be stereotypic, but inappropriate urination (spraying or weeing in the wrong place) are not.

A stereotypic behaviour is one that is carried out over and over in an identical way every time. The behaviour itself is either useless / abnormal (e.g. backflipping in mice) or a natural behaviour that is not appropriate to the situation (e.g. digging is a natural behaviour for gerbils, but those kept without proper depth bedding may scratch in empty cage corners for hours at a time).

So overgrooming, where the cat simply licks the same area over and over until it causes baldness or even injury, may be stereotypic. Spraying is simply territory marking, which may be hormonal / instinctive (e.g. in entire males) or fear related (neighbours cats coming into the house may cause spraying in resident cat). Weeing in the wrong place can have many causes - inc basic lack of training, being taken from mum / litter too young, health problems, hormones, dirty litter tray, fear, etc.

Learned helplessness is certainly seen in dogs "trained" using inhumane methods. For example, using harsh punishment to stop an unwanted behaviour may cause the animal to stop offering ANY behaviour, because it is too afraid to try anything new. 
In lab conditions, animals that are given random shocks (where they can not get away, have no reliable warning system etc) often develop learned helplessness - they know they can not escape the shock so are resigned to it. They just sit there and let it happen.

Inactivity is often the result of depression (in animals depression refers to a physical state rather than the emotional state it usually means in humans). It is a common product of chronic stress, found in both captive animals and in domestic animals kept in poor conditions. Animals that are housed in small and / or barren environments, and are unable to exhibit natral behaviours, may simply stop doing anything. They just sit there.

Hyperactivity may be caused by a variety of things - diet is one obvious cause. An inappropriate diet can cause hyperactivity, and it is not unusal for pet behaviourists (certainly dog behaviourists) to recommend diet changes where hyperactivity is a problem. Over-stimulation is another potential cause (if the animal is not allowed to rest properly or there is too much going on for it to cope with, it may become hyper).

I must admit cat behaviour is not my forte (I concentrated mainly on dogs and rodents). Aside from overgroomnig I can't think of any common stereotypies found in domestic cats, and I wasn't aware that inactivity, hyperactivity or learned helplessness were common problems either.... Do you have to do these 4 things, or could you choose others? 

Are you studying AT college or online / correspondance? If you're at college you should have access to a decent library containing up to date books on animal behaviour. You should also have acces to Athens or similar for published journals.
I think even correspondance courses give reading lists - it is well worth looking at them!

Hope this helps a bit.


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## bibliochic (Nov 12, 2009)

Colette said:


> Are you studying AT college or online / correspondance? If you're at college you should have access to a decent library containing up to date books on animal behaviour. You should also have acces to Athens or similar for published journals.
> I think even correspondance courses give reading lists - it is well worth looking at them!


Where are you studying? You should definitely have access to a library, and e-mailing a librarian could give you some great pointers on how to find the resources you need for your assignment.

If you don't have ready access to a library, try online. Obviously be careful about information you find online, but Google Scholar (Google Scholar) has the same search interface as Google and provides reputable articles. Similarly, Google Books is helpful although it doesn't often give you the full text. I did a quick search for stereotypic cat behaviour which gave the example of repetitive wool chewing in cats. (In Problem-based Feline Medicine by Rand, 2006.) There looks to be a load of resources out there.

I hope that helps somewhat.


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## Woodysausage (Oct 9, 2010)

Thank you very much. Collette, that is brilliant advice. I have given up on finding abnormal behaviour in cats though as, like you said, most of them are normal for the cat, just very annoying for the owner! I've changed to dogs and have gone for repetitive licking (stress, skin condition) and hyperactivity. I do have to use those 4 behaviours so I have chosen elephants for inactivity and learned helplessness.

I am studying at a college but I haven't got access to the library for the next couple of weeks so I'm mainly relying on the internet at the moment. As soon as I can get to the library I will.

Many thanks again.

Jo


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