Left or Right Pawed ???

Richard Macey
September 1, 2006
SMH

YOUR dog is inquisitive and loves exploring the neighbourhood. Or he is timid, nervous, and prefers sticking nearer to home.

His behaviour could be linked to his being left- or right-pawed.

And before you punt your wages on the next race at Randwick, it might be handy to know whether the horse, thanks to being left- or right-hoofed, prefers galloping clockwise, as they do in NSW, or anti-clockwise, as in Victoria.

There is growing evidence, says Paul McGreevy, a senior lecturer in the University of Sydney's Faculty of Veterinary Science, that behavioural traits in many animals, including dogs and horses, are linked to their handedness, or "laterality".

That animals have a preferred side has been accepted for almost 20 years. Now Dr McGreevy is conducting a three-year study, funded by the Australian Research Council, to explore "pawedness" in dogs.

His students have tested 270, giving them food cylinders and watching which paw they use to hold them steady. Repeating the experiment 100 times on each dog, they found about 15 per cent are left-pawed, 15 per cent right-pawed, and the rest are neither.

"Dogs that lack any bias are more likely to have noise phobias," Dr McGreevy said. "They get upset by thunderstorms and fireworks. If we can show laterality is a predictor of a dog's motivation or reluctance to explore, we can help guide dog and sniffer dog trainers select the right animals."

Knowing which side of a dog's brain is dominant could change pet training.

"There is a convention to train dogs on the left of the trainer. It's a human convention we have imposed, and it's unlikely to suit all dogs equally."

There appeared to be no differences in pawedness between breeds, but "males are more likely to be left than right, and females more likely to be right than left".

He has also confirmed "hoofedness" in racing horses. After watching 186 grazing in paddocks, observing whether they put their left or right hoofs forward as they ate, he found 40 per cent had a left preference, while 10 per cent had a right bias. The rest had none.

A horse might develop more powerful muscles on, for example, its right side, as a result of its hoofedness. It might thus excel on right curving tracks, but be disadvantaged going anti-clockwise.

That animals share the human trait of being left- or right-handed should not be surprising.

"It's evidence we all came from a common ancestor."