Genetic testing predicts appearance but not behavior in dogs.

ABSTRACT: Genetic tests for behavioral and personality traits in dogs are now being marketed to pet owners, but their predictive accuracy has not been validated. To evaluate the reliability of such tests, we analyzed data from Darwin's Ark, a community science initiative that includes over 3,000 dogs with both genetic data and individual-level behavioral phenotypes. None of the candidate variants had significant associations or predictive power for behavioral traits as previously reported. However, we found strong associations with aesthetic traits that differentiate breeds, such as height, leg length, and ear shape. Our results suggest that earlier studies using breed-average phenotypes, rather than individually measured phenotypes, were confounded by population structure. Behavior in dogs is polyg

SUBMITTER: Lord KA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12684939 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature